This book was vastly disappointing.

It started off well enough, almost-30-year-old Darby having just lost his job, and getting completely burned out on NYC. When his mom decides to downsize his childhood home and move to a condo, Darby thinks its time to return to the small-minded small town of Oak Falls. He's hardly been back since he left for college, missing only two things: his former best friend, and the bookstore where they spent their afternoons. Darby hasn't spoken to Michael since the falling out they had in high school, long before Darby transitioned. But when he returns to the home he never quite fit into, he finds that the world changed while he was gone, and Oak Falls isn't the stifling place it once was. Not to mention, the absolutely impossible things that happen every time Darby goes into In Between Books...

This book had potential, and I'm all for contemporary magic and timey-wimey stuff. Missing the mark, this time-portal bookstore seemed to serve one single purpose, and that was to get adult Darby to talk to teenage Darby. And they barely did that until it was almost too late. Not to mention that adult Darby was an almost unbearable wet blanket almost the whole book. Miserable in NY, sure. Miserable when returning home, absolutely. But it didn't seem to be until the literal final chapter that he finally lightned up. In fact, he was a rude jerk to everyone the entire time. His reconnection with Michael was without, too, and the guy deserved way better. I hope he got closure, because I sure didn't.

While the storytelling lacked, the writing quality was good. I'd love to read a revised version of this, with Darby acting a little kinder. And maybe give us some more information on the magical bookstore?

2.5 stars

I got this book as an ARC and I am happy I read it. It's a pretty quick read and flows well. I enjoyed the authors voice for Darby.

The book FELT like it was leading up to something more than just personal discovery. Don't get me wrong, I was fine with how it went and ended but it had potential to be more. I can't really say much without spoiling up but the time "traveling" bookstore didn't really do much besides help the main characters personal reflection.

I wouldn't read this book again but I did like it. It isn't a book I am going to shout about to my friends or talk about in the future. it was emotional to me as someone who moved away from a "small town" to discover myself but I wanted more.

This is the story of Darby, a trans man who left his hometown never to come back so he could create the life he wanted with found family in NYC. As a result of several overlapping circumstances, he ends up having to go back home.

As walks through the doors of the bookstore where he used to work, he sees his teenager self behind the counter. Caught in between the now and then, Darby puts both the past and present puzzle pieces of his life together and works towards healing some of his trauma as he revisits his journey.

I loved every moment I spent with this touching and lovely book.

with gratitude to netgalley and Avon for an advanced copy in exchange for an honest review

A trans man returns to the small town he was raised in after being laid off from his job in New York. The small town that always felt too small, too closed minded, and too old fashioned to welcome change. New York had felt like a safe place for Darby, who made friends like him and transitioned with their love and support.

When Darby returns to his hometown, he learns that his childhood best friend Michael has come out as gay during Darby’s time away. Darby and Michael had a falling out before Darby left for boarding school - a falling out that has always confused Darby, who never stopped caring about Michael.

Also in his hometown is the independent bookstore he worked in during high school. To his complete surprise, the store is unchanged. It smells the same. It looks the same. Darby cannot believe the condition of the store; it feels like he just left yesterday. Then he notices the lack of new releases, and the girl behind the counter that has his eyes. The girl that, impossibly, is pre-transition Darby. Somehow the bookstore has transported Darby back to 2009, where it is days before he and Michael had a fight that changed their friendship forever.

This book felt like a hug. It was warm and healing. My only complaint is the ending - it felt lackluster. But lovely, lovely story.

A little too on the disillusioned and melancholic side for me. I understand the author's previous works were YA so I was a little thrown by the malaise inherent in the story, even though the character landscape and dialogues were very vivid and engaging. The magical realism of this leaned too far from the whimsy of magic and more towards the realism, which in itself isn't a bad thing. But I guess I was hoping for more...wonder, given the bookstore and second chances vibes.

This is a deeply personal book to me, first of all I have to thank the author for writing a trans guy that is not in their teenage years. It is not often I see people my age in books that have a trans MC so I appreciated that a lot.

Darby was very relatable, specially at the beginning of the story. Having left his small town for a big city where he felt accepted is something I can relate to. At the beginning of the story we find he has just lost his job and decides for a change of scenery and go back to his small town to help his mom move while running into his childhood friend who he had a falling out with.

There he also finds that the bookstore he use to work at makes him travel back in time and come face to face with his younger self. It was sweet and it was a story I read surprisingly fast because I wanted to know what happened next.

After the 70% is when I start losing a bit of my likeability for Darby, I feel like he's almost there with a good come to Jesus moment and then he doesn't reach that moment. It was frustrating to read as I wanted him to realize that his issues could be solved if he talked to people in his life (his friends, Michael, his mother). At the end I felt he was a little bit of a selfish character though he complained often inwardly about the selfish thoughts he had.

I understand what the author wanted to do with the ending but it felt bitter sweet and that maybe we went through this journey for not a lot of payoff. But that's life sometimes so in that way I suppose to book was very real to what the human experience is like.

I initially was drawn in by the mention of a bookstore, in the title, and then, it just got more gravitational from there. We've got a sort of time traveling bookstore, BUT, it doesn't completely send you back in time. As soon as you exit, you return to the present. Exploring paths not taken, regrets, family (both found and genetic), and where your people are were all phenomenally done. If anyone finds themselves wishing the book ended differently, just remember, in another lifetime it did.

Really enjoyed this book & as someone with social anxiety connected with some of the choices and things in this book some will not.

A really great read - definitely worth recommending to others and re-reading again in the future.

In someways it fell kind of flat and was slow burnish to me but I still really enjoyed it & think it’ll be a hit in 2025!

Thanks to NetGalley and the publisher for the opportunity to read this lovely story in exchange for my honest review.

thank you netgalley for the e-arc of this book!

This touches on so many necessary topics. Its themes resonate with the times. Somewhere around the 60% mark, I lost the urge to read it, perhaps feeling like this could have been more of a novella. i did dnf.

Final rating: 3 Stars.

This was one of those books where it wasn’t terrible, but it wasn’t spectacular either. The writing was solid, I’m not crazy about voice, but it was still engaging enough for me to stick with it. The characters were interesting. The plot was…interesting. I wouldn’t say I had a terrible time; I just didn’t have an amazing time either.

My feelings towards this book are so strange that I can’t accurately put into words what they are. This wasn’t bad at all, but I don’t think it was the book for me. Solid 3 stars for me, but I do think that this tale will resonate with others.

Actually 3.5. <3 Netgalley <3

An "it's not me, it's you" kind of book. I don't think it's bad, I just don't think it was for me.

I also kind of feel like labeling it as sci-fi/fantasy isn't the best move, it's closer to literary? Yeah, there is an element of that with the time travel, but given that it was kind of the selling point of the book to me it was...kind of underutilized. That entire plot point could have been cut and the story would effectively not change. The time travel is effectively just a metaphor for Darby reflecting on his actions before leaving his hometown. If you go into it like me expecting that to be a more focused on plot point, you're going to be disappointed.

Darby can be pretty relatable with his social anxiety and teen angst, but he's pretty consistently a bad friend. He doesn't reply to his found family back in NYC for pretty much the whole book, and the entire plot happens because he fails to communicate properly with Michael as a teen. We also learn he like never speaks to his mother? Darby seems to have some kind of a character growth realization moment at the end, but because this is one of the most consistent patterns we see with his behavior it kind of adds a layer of,,,just annoyance throughout the book.

One thing I did really, really enjoy was Darby's relationship with Michael. Watching it progress and learning more about their past as friends was cool. That ending beat the shit out of me though. My god.

I do love reading books about trans adults because there aren't a whole lot of them and it's always a bonus when an actual trans person is writing it. I had a different experience from Darby, but it was pretty cool coming across things where our trans experiences still overlapped. You can tell the author put a lot of himself into the book. I think for someone who has shared more experiences with the author, it'll be a 5 star.

I was initially drawn in by Darby’s internal conflicts and the complicated relationship with ‘home’ and childhood born his queerness and transness. His memories of his teenage years were all warped through the lens of this hidden turmoil he couldn't even name yet at the time. And it’s stuck that way even as an adult far from his hometown, he’s carrying that. The use of the time travel element as a device to reframe this time of his life, allowing him to see that wider, adult perspective, hooked me. However, I wasn’t fully satisfied with how it played out. The magical element went fairly underused. Darby‘s character development ended up feeling a little weak. The themes and emotions it explored could have gone deeper and gotten more evocative.

The story was entertaining and flowed very well. I enjoyed the writing and I liked the main character. The main character was one that you wanted to root for and have him end up happy.

A book hadn't made me tear up so much in a very long time, and on the simplest scenes. The characters were very relatable. The way the time travelling is explained is satisfying. I love how diverse the cast is. This is my first Edward Underhill book read and I will definitely be reading more of his books.

The ending was bittersweet and I didn't mind at all because it felt real. Like it's a scenario that would happen in real life and it's not the "and they lived happily ever after" ending that a lot of books have.

3/5 ⭐️
I have mix feelings about this book, the premise was actually very good but I feel like it needed to go more in depth about what the MC wanted in life. This was a good read and I would definitely read this author again. Thank you NetGalley for allowing me this ARC in exchange for my honest review.

I would like to thank the author and Avon | Harper Voyager Publishing for providing me with an ARC of this book. The anticipated publication date is 14 January 2025.

Although The In-Between Bookstoredeviates slightly from my typical reading preferences, its inclusion of time travel and bookstores captured my interest. I found the author's writing style and humor appealing from the outset. The interactions between the main character and his mother were particularly amusing. I also love a book that can evoke all of the emotions, and this one did just that; certain parts of the dialogue had me on the verge of tears.

The time travel element of the narrative sustained the book’s momentum, rendering it a compelling, fast-paced read. However, some parts of the story could have been better developed, especially regarding topics that I am less familiar with, and probably other readers as well. A more thorough exploration of certain conversations would have improved the story and filled in some gaps. I found the ending to be disappointing, and after finishing the story, I was still left with many unanswered questions. Another round of edits could have improved this book substantially.

This story teetered between 3 and 4 stars, but I'm rounding down to a 3—it has a decent premise but average execution. I would still recommend this book as I think it has potential. Keep an eye out for this author!

**2.5 stars, rounded up

As a trans man who grew up in the midwest (not Illinois), moved to a much more liberal place, and is currently working on a graduate degree, I wanted to like this book SO bad. I often think about if a 15-year-old me would know who I am, if she would believe me about what we would become, and so having that idea be put into a book really caught my attention. It feels like it was made for me.

Problems: it's way more YA than I typically read, even though it's marketed as an adult fiction book. Darby and Michael both bothered me in the sense that the only reason this book even continued the way it did was because you had two men who refused to communicate, despite the fact they are now in their 30s when this book is occurring. And of course, there is a brief romance plot between the two, but to me, it just felt unnatural.

That, and the answer to the premise of 'what would you tell your younger self' is apparently nothing until 80% of the way through the book. Until then, we get a lot of half conversations between young and old Darby, where old Darby is trying to get information about why he and Michael are no longer friends, but like, why does he care? I get he thinks he can change it, but I just found myself not caring why they were arguing in the first place.

Despite all this, I actually did like the ending and how it wasn't necessarily 'happy' - it was realistic, it was genuine. I just didn't feel particularly connected to anyone in the book, despite the fact some of the things Darby said were relatable.

Thank you to NetGalley and the publisher for an ARC in exchange for an honest review.

It took me a while to get into reading this one. But it gave me “midnight library” vibes. I don’t know that I can say much about it. But it is a good read once you get into the story.

Darby is a trans man living in New York City when he’s fired due to the start up failing. His mom is moving into a condo in his home town outside of Chicago. So Darby leaves his apartment and his friends and goes home to help his mom. His childhood best friend who stopped talking to him senior year is now a gay teacher at their old school. The bookstore Darby used to work at is still there and when he goes in he’s transported back to before he left town. But it only happens in the bookstore. The story develops from there.

It’s really all about miscommunication and perceived insults influencing our lives and about the road not taken.

The story was entertaining, tender, original, and flowed very well. I really enjoyed the main character and wanted a good outcome for him. Thanks to Netgalley for the ARC.

A lot of people talk about having a book end in a “happily ever after” and how it wraps up the book in a bow and it’s great. The In Between Bookstore didn’t have a HEA, it had something better, this strong sense of melancholy combined with optimism. Edward Underhill is an incredible author and I always know that what i’m going to read is going to make me think and feel so strongly that I don’t stop thinking about it until I read something else that feels the same way. The In Between Bookstore was no different. Darby’s story of not knowing hit me so strongly and will continue to hit me anytime I think about.