Book Review: Beach Read
I literally just googled “books for summer”, and this gem appeared. Because the internet knows. I devoured “Beach Read” by Emily Henry in 9 days, and if I didn’t have to work to support my obnoxious living habits, I probably would have finished it in 10 hours. Straight. Without eating or taking bathroom breaks. Because I really, really loathed to put it down.
“Augustus Everett is an acclaimed author of literary fiction. January Andrews writes bestselling romance. When she pens a happily ever after, he kills off his entire cast.
They’re polar opposites.
In fact, the only thing they have in common is that for the next three months, they're living in neighboring beach houses, broke, and bogged down with writer's block.
Until, one hazy evening, one thing leads to another and they strike a deal designed to force them out of their creative ruts: Augustus will spend the summer writing something happy, and January will pen the next Great American Novel. She’ll take him on field trips worthy of any rom-com montage, and he’ll take her to interview surviving members of a backwoods death cult (obviously). Everyone will finish a book and no one will fall in love. Really.”
There is honestly nothing that I can think of that I didn’t enjoy about this book.
1) I loved reading about writers. I could relate to January’s habit of making everything a story, of seeing real life as writing fodder. This book is as much, if not more, about writer’s block than it is about romance. Seeing all of my weird writer habits and thoughts laid out on the page was so validating and gave me a sense of camaraderie. Because while January and Gus may be fictional, Emily Henry is real, and, based on how she writes, she apparently thinks a lot like me.
2) The conclusion was a perfect happy ending that didn’t feel like a given. This author doesn’t try to package this book as anything other than what it is: a beachy, summer romance. So you would think you could safely assume that everything will end happily, but there were moments in this book where I thought it might not all go as I wanted. This element brought a sense of suspense that I don’t usually get with traditional romance novels. It made me appreciate the happy ending more because I wasn’t entirely sure I would get it.
3) Emily Henry did a great job with her side characters and plots. I can’t tell you the number of romance novels I have read where the supporting characters might as well be cardboard cutouts standing on the periphery of the plot. Not the case with this book. I adored January’s best friend Shadi and their relationship. The bond between Gus and his aunts felt full and sincere, not a forced family dynamic. The emotional development and conflicts outside of January and Gus as a couple are strong and well-developed. Henry crafted all of her characters into rich and relatively complex individuals with well-constructed relationships to one another, raising the book to a whole other level.
4) It is HYSTERICAL. I laughed out loud so many times during this book (like actually lol’d not just that little snort thing we all do). The banter between January and Gus is so quick and witty. There is a fantastic flow to it, and it felt believable to me throughout the whole book. Between January and Shadi’s running jokes, the warm, familial teasing between Gus and his aunts, and the flirty banter between our main couple, the book feels fun, clever, and bright.
5) And while it is charming and playful and delightful, it is not shallow. It’s almost difficult to classify this book as purely romance or rom-com because it has dark moments. There are drive-in movies and carnivals and hot air balloons, but there are also suicide cults and some truly damaged people in seriously messy situations. Emily Henry has struck an excellent balance of cutesy love story and raw, damaged humanity, and that emotional depth and range heighten and enrich this reading experience exponentially.
I sincerely loved this book and can guarantee I will be rereading it for many summers to come. “Beach Read” is a romance novel you can take seriously. It is self-aware, unique, hilarious, and gives the reader those oh-so-wonderful romance novel butterflies without drowning us in flat characters and overly saccharine storylines. For my fellow romantics who still like a little substance with their sweet, especially those of you with a writer’s brain: this book is for you.
