⭐️⭐️⭐️From William Morrow Publishing: Back in high school, everybody thought Shiloh and Cary would end up together . . . everybody but Shiloh and Cary.
They were just friends. Best friends. Allies. They were both going to get out of north Omaha—Shiloh would go to go to college and become an actress, and Cary would join the Navy. They promised each other that their friendship would never change.
And yet, somehow, everything changed.
Now Shiloh’s thirty-three, and it’s been fourteen years since she talked to Cary. She’s been married and divorced. She has two kids. And she’s back living in the same house she grew up in. Her life is nothing like she planned.
When she’s invited to an old friend’s wedding, all Shiloh can think about is whether Cary will be there—and whether she hopes he will be.
It’s the story of Shiloh and Cary, who everyone thought would end up together, trying to find their way back to the start.
**********************
My review: I really liked Landline by Rowell. Super fun and made me think. This book was much slower to get into but I was interested in Shiloh and Cary. The idea of can you revisit or reinstate a high school intense relationship? Lots of romance books center around this idea. Shiloh and Cary seemed "regular". No one was rich or famous, as is often a trope in romance. Maybe that's what kept me interested. The back and forth between their teen years and the present was a good way to invest the reader and help understand both of their feelings.
While parts of the book seemed to drag I was involved and hopeful. I wanted it to work more for Cary than Shiloh, but I wanted them to live happily ever after. Overall, a story about two imperfect people trying to find a perfect ending.

⭐️⭐️⭐️Thank you to NetGalley and William Morrow Publishing for an advance digital copy in exchange for my review.

The real star of this book is the pacing. It expands and contracts through time in a really creative way. It felt very true to how various seasons of life feel and are experienced differently. So much of this story made me cringe deeply, but that is clearly intentional and core to the characters. In the end, I think this is a bit too long and could be tightened quite a bit. That said, it’s a great entry to the slow burn and friends to lovers genres, with Rainbow Rowell’s typical charm. Thank you to netgalley and the publishing team for access to an early copy in exchange for this honest review.

I wasn't prepared for this book to be as serious as it is, and I admit I'm often in the mood for something light and frothy. It's really good, though! It feels incredibly authentic, and I'm dying to know whether the embryo of this book was an Eleanor and Park sequel that evolved a lot (a lot! it's not the same set-up at all!) over time. The characters are great, and it's painfully real. Second-chance romances sometimes don't make sense to me, but this one did. It makes so much sense it like a knife to the heart. But I love Rainbow Rowell, and I will read anything she writes.

Thank you to NetGalley and Rainbow Rowell for providing me with an ARC of *Slow Dance*.

I really enjoyed this book. Shiloh and Cary’s story of rekindling a high school friendship into something deeper really resonated with me. I’m a sucker for “we grew up together and were always in love but didn’t realize it until adulthood” stories, and this one did not disappoint. I loved how Rowell’s writing captured their deep history and connection. Her humor and poignant passages were a delight.

The characters felt incredibly real, and their family situations were depicted with a subtlety that felt genuine. However, I felt the book was a bit light on plot, making it feel somewhat long and slow at times due to the frequent timeline jumps. Despite this, the emotional journey and character development were compelling.

Rowell masterfully conveyed complex emotions and the messy, imperfect nature of relationships. The ending, thankfully, avoided unnecessary tragedy and left me feeling satisfied. This book is heartwarming, frustrating, romantic, and hopeful all at once. Highly recommended if you enjoy deep character explorations and second-chance love stories.

Thank you again for the opportunity to experience this story!

i feel like this book exists within a small box. i never want to leave this box. i think i will reread this book again and again. i love everything about it and the natural-ness of it. rainbow rowell has a way of writing that makes you just go ‘i see exactly what this means’ and everything feels very fluid and honest and real and normal. this was so NORMAL. and it was so heartwarming and gorgeous and touching and lovely.

Theres nothing I love more than a second chance romance friends to lovers. Ive always been a fan of Rainbow Rowell so when I saw that she was realizing a new book I knew I had to read it. As always I was hooked from the first page and I finished this in a sitting. The longing, the yearning and how much they clearly loved each other made my heart ache, this story was beautifully written and I loved reading the before and the present and how the got together, this story was so good and it reminded me why I love friends to lovers so much.

Thank you to the publisher and to netgalley for sending this my way!

I have been dreading writing this review because I am a long-time Rainbow Rowell fan and I had that I had some negative feelings about this one. I remember a few years ago that there was some controversy over racist or at least racially insensitive content in Eleanor and Park, so maybe I was primed to pay particular attention to problematic elements, but I did cringe a few times reading this. Overall, this is a great romance plot - Shiloh, Cary, and Mikey were best friends in high school, but grew apart - especially Shiloh and Cary, who everyone assumed was either already a couple in high school or would be eventually. Fast forward to now (or technically 2006) - Shiloh is a divorced mother of two young kids and she sees Cary for the first time in more than a decade at Mikey's wedding. They reconnect and try to figure out what they can be to each other after all that time. The story alternates between various points in the past (mostly high school) and the present. There are a lot of great side characters here - especially Junie, Shiloh's daughter who I found completely hilarious - and I liked the plot points about navigating challenging family relationships. Now for the things that bugged me - I felt like there was some very odd stuff about queer sexualities in this (even though Shiloh is portrayed as a queer/bi character), and discussions of crime/safety issues in Shiloh and Cary's childhood (and Shiloh's current) neighborhood read as potentially racially coded to me. It was hard for me to tell if these things were included in the narrative as, like, a commentary, or if they were just insensitive. I think this would have benefitted from a sensitivity reader. While I did enjoy the characters and plot, I want to be honest in this review and say that I felt uncomfortable at several points in the narrative.

I have previously absolutely loved Rainbow Rowell's books so I was very excited to snag this ARC! That being said, this story was a bit of a disappointment for me! This book felt like an anthem for "weird kids" who grew up into "weird adults" and I mean that in the most positive light. I have always appreciated Rowell's characters for not being the stereotypical model-quality heroes and heroines. I think that is so refreshing to see (especially in a romance novel), and I did enjoy that in this book also. I had a very hard time connecting with the main character, Shiloh, because I ultimately don't feel like I understood her or why she is the way that she is. There were a LOT of unanswered questions surrounding her by the end of the book, and since this story is extremely character focused rather than plot focused, it left me feeling unsatisfied.

Her high school best-"extremely platonic"-best friend Cary carried the story for me and I felt the most sympathetic towards him. He was dealt some rough cards in life and at times I'm not sure how he wasn't completely over Shiloh fighting and arguing with him every step of the way in addition to everything else he was dealing with. Also, Shiloh's work friend Tom was amazing and I needed about 300% more of Tom.

I'll continue to read Rainbow Rowell's books in the future, this one just happened to not be for me!

4.5 rounded down!! I really liked this - the “we grew up together and were always in love but didn’t realize it until adulthood and now we have a second chance, maybe” storyline gets me probably more than any other. I love when the characters already have a deep history and connection. I love Rainbow’s writing style and her humor - there were a lot of perfection passages and sentences that I screenshotted to come back to. I was very invested but for whatever reason I wasn’t completely DESTROYED which is why I went down to 4 instead of up to 5. But there are many many great things about this book. I also really liked how their family situations were talked about - much of what was happening with Cary’s mom (grandma) was very familiar to me and I like how they didn’t make a huge deal over the things she was going through and her situation with her house etc, it was just part of the story. My one sort of critique is that it felt like there wasn’t a lot of plot and because of that, and how we kept jumping back and forth in time, it felt a big long without much really happening or being moved along. But it was a story told well nonetheless and I enjoyed these characters and getting to spend some time with them. (Also since it wasn’t written in the typical format of “something bad happening around 70%,” when I was getting close to the very end I was terrified that there would suddenly be a huge tragedy and everything would fall apart. Thankfully we made it through!! ❤️)

Let me preface this review by saying I have thoroughly enjoyed the Rainbow Rowell I've read to date, especially Eleanor and Park and Fangirl. Landline was just so so for me, but I also really enjoyed Attachments. So, all of this to say, I wasn't sure where on the spectrum of like to love I'd end up with this one when I requested it on Netgalley.

As teenagers, Shiloh, Cary and Mikey were always together. The three went to prom together and did yearbook and were generally a package deal. That's not to say that Shiloh and Cary didn't have their own special connection and a lot of tension, leading many a close friend or relative to wonder if they were together. Fast forward fifteen-ish years and the three are reunited at Mikey's second wedding in their hometown of Omaha. Cary and Shiloh reconnect and in some ways it's like they were never apart to begin with. With so many words unspoken between the two and so many more misconstrued, where will they land this time as adults?

This was good, but not incredibly memorable for me. It won't stick out the way Fangirl and Eleanor and Park did, but it was still an enjoyable read. I got a little sick of how in her own head Shiloh was, but Cary seemed to have patience in spades so it all seemed to work out well. It was a sweet story.

Read if you like:
✅ Second chance romance
✅ Friends to lovers
✅ Military rep
✅ Small town romance

⭐⭐⭐

I received this ARC in exchange for my honest review.

This was a fun intense version of a beach read. I loved some of the tropes used and thought it was a nice plot.

Slow Dance is a tale about a woman that feels like she was never able to escape her life. I feel like this theme is overdone so I was a little bored with this book. I do like how Rainbow Rowell writes though.

I didn't know I was in the mood for a slow burn, adult, realistic romance until I picked this up. Fair warning, I love a lot of Rowell's work, but have been reading darker lately. But this was sad and real and beautiful. Long term pining, good friendships, good parenting, cute kids. I felt like I was learning about people I care about and wanted to cheer for, even if they aren't perfect. Because who of us is? Beautiful and I think romance and Rowell fans will love this.

Rainbow Rowell has a special way of writing that feels so cozy. It's warm and comforting and completely midwestern in a way that only midwesterners can capture. I loved how all of her books feel like coming home but with big hearts and swoony romance.

Slow Dance is Rainbow Rowell for grown ups. It's sweet and swoony, but with a little more spice that normal. It's the second chance-ish, friends to lovers, slow burn story of Cary and Shiloh. They were best friends in high school who meet again at a wedding 15 years later. In completely different phases of life, they connect deeply and instantly. We get both their past and present stories (in the way of Love and Other Words) and both timelines kept me wanting more. I sat down to read half and read all. It was totally worth the binge.

FIVE STARS! I cannot begin to describe how much I loved the WRITING of this book!

Rainbow Rowell gives readers a complicated, frustrating, lovely, and endearing novel about Cary and Shiloh, two friends with insecurities that only the other can appreciate. I’m being vague about plot because it was my favorite part about the book.

Rowell effortlessly takes us on a non-linear tour of these people’s lives through the years that fills my curiosity with great dialogue, plot, and resolution at perfect intervals. Shiloh and Cary (great use of gender neutral names, btw) are the perfect imperfect literary couple. Their complicated upbringing gives them battle scars they take with them throughout the story. Their lives connect at various points in their adulthood, but not without frustration and disappointment. Who do they choose? Why is life hard? Will their lives become simple for once?

For me, a bonus came at 90% into the book, where I felt it could have ended, but the last 10% became the third act. We know what happens to Cary and Shiloh, how they live beyond the final act, and the choices they make. This is how all books should end: without readers wondering what happens next?

In the case of Slow Dance, I already know and I’m not left wondering. Instead, I’m left satisfied with the ending, with the writing, with the whole arc. And you should, too. Highly recommend if you like the idea of a John Hughes film getting a reimagining by a nostalgic, forward-thinking author with magical storytelling superpowers!

Such a lovely, quiet story. At turns frustrating, sad, achingly romantic, and hopeful, this was a magical novel.

Rainbow Rowell is masterful at conveying these complex, layered human emotions. The first time Cary and Shiloh speak, in the current timeline, I could already feel the wistfulness. I knew nothing about their backstory at this point, who they had been to each other, what happened between them - but it didn't matter. I was so wrapped up in Shiloh's head, and her feelings twined through the prose in a way that made them impossible to escape. From there, I only grew more attached to this messy, loving relationship.

Cary and Shiloh are wonderfully realized characters. Their stubbornness, quirks, and humor complement one another so well. Perhaps even more impressively, their characteristics are so thorough and so well conveyed that the miscommunication that leads to our starting point feels earned. You want to shake these characters and tell them to open their eyes, but you also fully understand why they worded it that way, and why the other interprets it differently. As the story continues to unfurl, this sense only gets deeper. The way Shiloh thinks about herself, and how that tracks through high school and to her divorce, all feels so organic. The characters felt real - even the children, which is an area in which I feel many authors struggle.

The story is rather light on plot - it's about these characters, the winding paths of their life and where that leads them, how they get in their own way - in one another's way. And that, too, feels amazingly real and grounded. There are aspects of the story that feel like they might lead to some big moment, but end with an understated discovery instead. Other plotlines are left open at the end, works in progress just like our lead characters.

I loved it. It had all of Rowell's trademark humor, with perhaps even more than the usual amount of heart.

**3.25⭐️ rounded down to 3**

Thank you NetGalley and William Morrow Books for early access to this ebook. It publishes on 7/23!

There was just a general awkwardness between the FMC, Shiloh and MMC, Cary. I buddy read this with @lloydreads and we both really thought these characters definitely loved each other but did they like each other? Unclear 😂 They were just odd both together and separately.

And they were just generally forgettable. Cary was a bit better but still an oddball that definitely had unresolved childhood trauma that probably should’ve been dealt with lol

The past/present timelines were good at first, but then they started jumping randomly. Sometimes we’d go back to the same part already told but from the other perspective.. but the story was told in third person??? So, I got confused with that a few times.

And the pivotal part of the story was really abrupt with the end of the book going too fast in comparison to the rest of it.

Overall, it was a quick read (super short chapters) with good writing overall, I just wasn’t sold on the story or romance. I would like to read a book by Rainbow Rowell that’s adult contemporary but without romance 🤔 I think that would be great!

Easily one of my top reads of 2024. Cary and Shiloh's relationship is riveting to watch and so grounded in reality that I feel like I've watched my two best friends fall in love. There's a depth to their relationship that is so stunning to read, they don't blindly love each other and think the other perfect. They see each other's faults (and even get frustrated with them) but they're so dedicated to one another that it doesn't diminish their love and devotion to one another. I adored this book, stayed until 1:30 in the morning to finish it. I wish I could experience reading it for the first time again. Also -- one of my favorite last lines of any romance book...ever. Beautiful!!

Really enjoyed this adult romance book from Rainbow Rowell who typically writes YA books. This book reminded me a bit of Normal People by Sally Rooney in that you knew every thing the female character was thinking. She's quirky, she's funny, she's insecure, she's afraid, she's all of the above when we sees her long ago best friend who she hasn't talked to in years. They meet again at a wedding of their "third" best friend and what follows is the two of them trying to figure out who they are now versus who they were then. Has time changed them? Has time hurt their friendship? What happened that they didn't talk for years?

I really liked these characters - flaws and all - as we have all them and it was so nice for an author to show the flaws.

Thank you to NetGalley, Rainbow Rowell and William Morrow for the ARC in exchange for my honest opinion.

Overall this was a cute romance. I wasn't blown away by this story like I have been with some of Rainbow Rowells other romances. This romance was not what I was expecting but it was a good story overall. I will say that there were some slow moments but overall it was a steady storyline. My biggest challenge with this story was that it took me much longer than normal to start to like the main character. They were both a little annoying in the present time but especially for the flashback chapters. I think that a lot of people will relate to this story and the idea of second chances and fate.

Thank you Net Galley for allowing me the chance to re this book early. The thoughts and opinions of this post are mine and mine alone.