Review: Book Lovers

Title: Book Lovers

Author: Emily Henry

Publisher: 12th May 2022 by Penguin General UK, Fig Tree, Viking

Pages: 384 pages

How I Read It: ARC book

Genre: women’s fiction, contemporary, romance

My Rating: 5 cups

Synopsis:

One summer. Two rivals. A plot twist they didn't see coming…

Nora is a cut-throat literary agent at the top of her game. Her whole life is books.

Charlie is an editor with a gift for creating bestsellers. And he's Nora's work nemesis.

Nora has been through enough break-ups to know she's the woman men date before they find their happy-ever-after. That's why Nora's sister has persuaded her to swap her desk in the city for a month's holiday in Sunshine Falls, North Carolina. It's a small town straight out of a romance novel, but instead of meeting sexy lumberjacks, handsome doctors or cute bartenders, Nora keeps bumping into...Charlie.

She's no heroine. He's no hero. So can they take a page out of an entirely different book?

My Thoughts

‘Maybe this is why people take trips, for that feeling of your real life liquefying around you, like nothing you do will tug on any other strand of your carefully built world. It’s a feeling not unlike reading a really good book: all-consuming, worry-obliterating.’

Finally I can claim, ‘Yes! I have read an Emily Henry book.’ Now, time to go back and read them all! I adored it! Simply stated, it is a book by a book lover, about book lovers and should be read by all book lovers. How freakin’ awesome!

‘It’s never taken effort - that’s what made me fall in love with reading: the instant floating sensation, the dissolution of real-world problems, every worry suddenly safely on the other side of some metaphysical surface.’

How can the one book contain so much! Let me tell you, through simply exquisite writing! You will get all the feels, all the laughs and yet still …. so much depth and true to life that lifts it into the stratosphere!

“I’m always a fan of the truth,” he says. “No one’s always a fan of the truth,” I say. “Sometimes the truth sucks.” “It’s always better to have the truth up front than to be misled.” “There’s still something to be said for social niceties.”

The banter between Nora and Charlie was so on point, it was good, not to mention a slow burn romance that is up there with the best of them. The commitment to family and siblings is inspiring. Nora and Libby’s relationship brought a tear to my eye. Yet, for me, watching Nora’s personal journey of growth … well, that left me speechless. I could feel everything she was feeling particularly with regards to her upbringing and a desire to hang onto certain traditions and memories.

‘The words break apart like alphabet soup, letters splintering off in every direction, utterly meaningless now.’

Book Lovers is fun and heart warming but also serious and sentimental. There was everything I was hoping for from an Emily Henry book -  a wonderful romance, a story of devoted siblings, a love of books sprinkled everywhere and a small town trope with a twist. I highly recommend this to romance lovers and book lovers in general!

‘That is what I’m looking for every time I flip to the back of a book, compulsively checking for proof that in a life where so many things have gone wrong, there can be beauty too. That there is always hope, no matter what.’

This review is based on a complimentary copy from the publisher in exchange for an honest review. Opinions expressed in this review are completely my own. The quoted material may have changed in the final release.