Women's Fiction
![Emily Henry - [object Object] author](https://res.cloudinary.com/readsomnia/image/upload/authors/a_B01BW7AX4W.jpg)
Book Lovers
"One of my favorite authors."
-Colleen Hoover
Named a Most Anticipated Book of 2022 by Oprah Daily ∙ Today ∙ Parade ∙ Marie Claire ∙ Bustle ∙ PopSugar ∙ Katie Couric Media ∙ Book Bub ∙ SheReads ∙ Medium ∙ The Washington Post ∙ and more!
An insightful, delightful new novel from the #1 New York Times bestselling author of Beach Read and People We Meet on Vacation.
One summer. Two rivals. A plot twist they didn't see coming...
Nora Stephens' life is books-she's read them all-and she is not that type of heroine. Not the plucky one, not the laidback dream girl, and especially not the sweetheart. In fact, the only people Nora is a heroine for are her clients, for whom she lands enormous deals as a cutthroat literary agent, and her beloved little sister Libby.
Which is why she agrees to go to Sunshine Falls, North Carolina for the month of August when Libby begs her for a sisters' trip away-with visions of a small town transformation for Nora, who she's convinced needs to become the heroine in her own story. But instead of picnics in meadows, or run-ins with a handsome country doctor or bulging-forearmed bartender, Nora keeps bumping into Charlie Lastra, a bookish brooding editor from back in the city. It would be a meet-cute if not for the fact that they've met many times and it's never been cute.
If Nora knows she's not an ideal heroine, Charlie knows he's nobody's hero, but as they are thrown together again and again-in a series of coincidences no editor worth their salt would allow-what they discover might just unravel the carefully crafted stories they've written about themselves.
-Colleen Hoover
Named a Most Anticipated Book of 2022 by Oprah Daily ∙ Today ∙ Parade ∙ Marie Claire ∙ Bustle ∙ PopSugar ∙ Katie Couric Media ∙ Book Bub ∙ SheReads ∙ Medium ∙ The Washington Post ∙ and more!
An insightful, delightful new novel from the #1 New York Times bestselling author of Beach Read and People We Meet on Vacation.
One summer. Two rivals. A plot twist they didn't see coming...
Nora Stephens' life is books-she's read them all-and she is not that type of heroine. Not the plucky one, not the laidback dream girl, and especially not the sweetheart. In fact, the only people Nora is a heroine for are her clients, for whom she lands enormous deals as a cutthroat literary agent, and her beloved little sister Libby.
Which is why she agrees to go to Sunshine Falls, North Carolina for the month of August when Libby begs her for a sisters' trip away-with visions of a small town transformation for Nora, who she's convinced needs to become the heroine in her own story. But instead of picnics in meadows, or run-ins with a handsome country doctor or bulging-forearmed bartender, Nora keeps bumping into Charlie Lastra, a bookish brooding editor from back in the city. It would be a meet-cute if not for the fact that they've met many times and it's never been cute.
If Nora knows she's not an ideal heroine, Charlie knows he's nobody's hero, but as they are thrown together again and again-in a series of coincidences no editor worth their salt would allow-what they discover might just unravel the carefully crafted stories they've written about themselves.
Editorial Reviews
[Book Lovers] is multilayered and the characters' familial challenges are complex. By both playing to and overtly subverting romance tropes and archetypes like the high-powered big city woman who neglects her family and the life-affirming power of small-town life, this novel delivers an insightful comedic meditation on love, family and going your own way."-NPR
"If Emily Henry makes herself laugh at the character's dialogue in her own books, it's understandable. She is a master at witty repartee….It's a safe bet that viewers would enjoy seeing Henry's characters come to life on screen."-Associated Press
"[P]erfect-for-summer rom com."-Parade
"Brimming with swoon-worthy moments, hilarious banter, and lovable characters…"-Women's World
"[A] fun and flirty romance"-Cosmo
"One of my favorite authors."
-Colleen Hoover, #1 New York Times bestselling author
"Book Lovers is a rom-com lover's dream of a book. It is razor-sharp and modern, featuring a fierce heroine who does not apologize for her ambition and heartfelt discussions of grief. Readers know that Emily Henry never fails to deliver great banter and a romance to swoon over but this may just be her best yet. A breath of fresh air."
-Taylor Jenkins Reid, New York Times bestselling author of Malibu Rising
"I would follow Emily Henry anywhere. A small town, a literary enterprise, a bookstore to rescue, and sex in moonlit streams? Yes, please! Book Lovers is sexy, funny, and smart. Another perfectly satisfying read from the unstoppable Emily Henry."
-Emma Straub, New York Times bestselling author of All Adults Here
"Emily Henry's books are a gift, the perfect balance between steamy and sweet. The prose is effortless, the characters charming. The only downside is reaching the end."
-V.E. Schwab, New York Times bestselling aut...
"If Emily Henry makes herself laugh at the character's dialogue in her own books, it's understandable. She is a master at witty repartee….It's a safe bet that viewers would enjoy seeing Henry's characters come to life on screen."-Associated Press
"[P]erfect-for-summer rom com."-Parade
"Brimming with swoon-worthy moments, hilarious banter, and lovable characters…"-Women's World
"[A] fun and flirty romance"-Cosmo
"One of my favorite authors."
-Colleen Hoover, #1 New York Times bestselling author
"Book Lovers is a rom-com lover's dream of a book. It is razor-sharp and modern, featuring a fierce heroine who does not apologize for her ambition and heartfelt discussions of grief. Readers know that Emily Henry never fails to deliver great banter and a romance to swoon over but this may just be her best yet. A breath of fresh air."
-Taylor Jenkins Reid, New York Times bestselling author of Malibu Rising
"I would follow Emily Henry anywhere. A small town, a literary enterprise, a bookstore to rescue, and sex in moonlit streams? Yes, please! Book Lovers is sexy, funny, and smart. Another perfectly satisfying read from the unstoppable Emily Henry."
-Emma Straub, New York Times bestselling author of All Adults Here
"Emily Henry's books are a gift, the perfect balance between steamy and sweet. The prose is effortless, the characters charming. The only downside is reaching the end."
-V.E. Schwab, New York Times bestselling aut...
Readers Top Reviews
stephy89L1ndsJ. W
I wasn’t sure what to expect from this book. I’ve read Beach Read and You and Me on Vacation and enjoyed them but they didn’t stick with me. I loved Book Lovers for so many reasons. I love Charlie and Nora, I loved that it’s not just a romance book but also a book about being a big sister. I laughed and I cried and I was so scared of the ending but I’m so glad i read this book.
Winstephy89L1ndsJ
Another massive win from Emily/for us! As expected, a beautifully written story with crystal clear descriptions that arent ridiculously flowery (thankfully) nor are they overused (she let out the breath she didn't know she was holding... Am I right?). As you can imagine, I'm not a big fan of long descriptions. I like action and lively diologue. But here Emily gives us LOL and heart breaking actions, superb diologue and descriptions that you've never read before and you wonder "how have these words never been used to describe this situation/characters/story before by another author?!". Emily was good before. But here she's a genius! A master of her craft! Someone to aspire to be like (or just become friends with). She doesn't need to get any better than this, but if she does, that would be a lottery winning ticket to us readers/her bank account and all the people behind the scenes that make this happen and get paid to do so. Apologies for all the rambling. I'm just so in love with this book/these characters/the tears she made me cry/the HEA! You probably read the blurb already, so now just jump right in. THIS is what 80% of the books should be like but aren't. Emily is magic! Having said all this, I have a small warning for you (regarding the content): one of the characters suffers from Parentification (if you are a new mom you may have come across this on IG or else you may identify with this character and understand why you behave the way that you do). I'm not going to explain this here as I'm not a therapist and it's not my place (but I would suggest a quick search to understand it). Some people may find it slightly (psychologically) triggering. It is beautifully done and not just a gimmick. Now buy it, stay up late reading it, cry over it and thank Emily later :)
LauraWinstephy89L
It’s 3:30 in the morning and I just finished this. I have a meeting (or meating, as I spelled it first, please see opening sentence about what time it is) in three hours. Point being, there’s no way I can write anything articulate or profound about this book right now. All I can say is that I loved it. I loved the characters. I loved the humor and the angst. I loved the ending. I don’t love that it’ll probably be at least a year until I get to read another Emily Henry book, but I know it’ll be worth it.
bookish_snippetsL
Guys this book 🥹 This is for the eldest sisters. For the little sisters. For the career driven women. For the tired moms. For the tall women. For the city girl. For the small town girl. For the ones who read the last page. For the millennials. For the women who wants it all. I feel like someone is going to identify with this story in some aspect or another. And the ending? The extended epilogue? Pure joy! I already want to reread it. I want to commit my favorite lines and moments to memory 🥲 What to expect: 📖 for the book lovers ✨ small town wanderlust 👯♀️ strong sister relationship 🐣 Beach Read easter eggs ✍️ life-changing vacation list: #6 🥵 🤭 so many laugh out loud scenes 🥺 sometimes life ‘just sucks’, but one day you'll find your 'settle' 📱 the communication, dialogue, banter are amazing!!! 😌 another book that made me believe in soulmates 💘 a meet rude, rivals to lovers 😏 I lowkey want someone to smirk-pout at me like the way Charlie does 🙅🏻♀️no miscommunication trope, tyvm • 18+ 🌶🌶/5 cw: loss of parent, grief, anxiety
Christy Baldwin B
I've come to the conclusion that Emily Henry writes the perfect romances for me. With each book she writes I fall more and more in love with her writing and characters. When I started this book, I had no idea how I would feel about it by the end. The heroine isn't your typical romance heroine and I loved that about her. Nora and Charlie were both fantastic and they just worked together. Nora Stephens is a ruthless literary agent and she's the best at her job. Work is her life, and aside from her sister Libby and her nieces, it's all she focuses on. Libby is the one person she can't say no to and when she asks her to take a trip with her before her due date (Libby is pregnant with niece number 3) she goes. To a small town named 'Sunshine Falls'. Libby has all kinds of things planned for Nora. She wants her to have the small town experience but the most surprising thing about Sunshine Falls is who she runs into there. Charlie Lastra. An editor from NYC who she's worked with in the past. I wouldn't quite call Nora and Charlie enemies or nemeses, but they're closer to that than to being friends. Nevertheless, they get each other. "I think you're one of the least disappointing people I've ever met." I don't know what I loved more about this book... Nora and Charlie, Nora and Libby, or just watching Nora grow and seeing who she really is. Getting to truly know her was the best part of this book. I love getting to see the why's. Why someone is the way they are. Being inside Nora's head was fascinating and I could relate to her as an older sister. Charlie was such a fantastic hero. He worked so well with Nora and he understood her in a way very few do. I loved that he appreciated her for who she was and loved her enough to want what was best for her. He had his broody and standoffish moments, but when he opened up he was beautiful. I also loved the banter and spark between them. Emily Henry not only gives us an incredible romance with Book Lovers, she gives us a story of siblings, the love of books, and a small town romance with a twist. I recommend this to all my romance lovers and book lovers in general!
Short Excerpt Teaser
PROLOGUE
When books are your life-or in my case, your job- you get pretty good at guessing where a story is going. The tropes, the archetypes, the common plot twists all start to organize themselves into a catalogue inside your brain, divided by category and genre.
The husband is the killer.
The nerd gets a makeover, and without her glasses, she's smoking hot.
The guy gets the girl-or the other girl does.
Someone explains a complicated scientific concept, and someone else says, "Um, in English, please?"
The details may change from book to book, but there's nothing truly new under the sun.
Take, for example, the small-town love story.
The kind where a cynical hotshot from New York or Los Angeles gets shipped off to Smalltown, USA-to, like, run a family-owned Christmas tree farm out of business to make room for a soulless corporation.
But while said City Person is in town, things don't go to plan. Because, of course, the Christmas tree farm-or bakery, or whatever the hero's been sent to destroy-is owned and operated by someone ridiculously attractive and suitably available for wooing.
Back in the city, the lead has a romantic partner. Someone ruthless who encourages him to do what he's set out to do and ruin some lives in exchange for that big promotion. He fields calls from her, during which she interrupts him, barking heartless advice from the seat of her Peloton bike.
You can tell she's evil because her hair is an unnatural blond, slicked back à la Sharon Stone in Basic Instinct, and also, she hates Christmas decorations.
As the hero spends more time with the charming baker/seamstress/tree farm . . . person, things change for him. He learns the true meaning of life!
He returns home, transformed by the love of a good woman. There he asks his ice-queen girlfriend to take a walk with him. She gapes, says something like, In these Manolos?
It will be fun, he tells her. On the walk, he might ask her to look up at the stars.
She snaps, You know I can't look up right now! I just got Botox!
And then he realizes: he can't go back to his old life. He doesn't want to! He ends his cold, unsatisfying relationship and proposes to his new sweetheart. (Who needs dating?)
At this point, you find yourself screaming at the book, You don't even know her! What's her middle name, bitch? From across the room, your sister, Libby, hushes you, throws popcorn at your head without lifting her gaze from her own crinkly-covered library book.
And that's why I'm running late to this lunch meeting.
Because that's my life. The trope that governs my days. The archetype over which my details are superimposed.
I'm the city person. Not the one who meets the hot farmer. The other one.
The uptight, manicured literary agent, reading manuscripts from atop her Peloton while a serene beach scene screen saver drifts, unnoticed, across her computer screen.
I'm the one who gets dumped.
I've read this story, and lived it, enough to know it's happening again right now, as I'm weaving through late-afternoon foot traffic in Midtown, my phone clutched to my ear.
He hasn't said it yet, but the hairs on the back of my neck are rising, the pit opening in my stomach as he maneuvers the conversation toward a cartoon-style drop off a cliff.
Grant was only supposed to be in Texas for two weeks, just long enough to help close a deal between his company and the boutique hotel they were trying to acquire outside San Antonio. Having already experienced two post–work trip breakups, I reacted to the news of his trip as if he'd announced he'd joined the navy and was shipping out in the morning.
Libby tried to convince me I was overreacting, but I wasn't surprised when Grant missed our nightly phone call three times in a row, or when he cut two others short. I knew how this ended.
And then, three days ago, hours before his return flight, it happened.
A force majeure intervened to keep him in San Antonio longer than planned. His appendix burst.
Theoretically, I could've booked a flight right then, met him at the hospital. But I was in the middle of a huge sale and needed to be glued to my phone with stable Wi-Fi access. My client was counting on me. This was a life-changing chance for her. And besides, Grant pointed out that an appendectomy was a routine procedure. His exact words were "no big deal."
So I stayed, and deep down, I knew I was releasing Grant to the small-town-romance-novel gods to do with what they do best.
Now, three days later, as I'm practically sprinting to lunch in my Good Luck heels, my knuckles white against my phone, the reverberation of the nail ...
When books are your life-or in my case, your job- you get pretty good at guessing where a story is going. The tropes, the archetypes, the common plot twists all start to organize themselves into a catalogue inside your brain, divided by category and genre.
The husband is the killer.
The nerd gets a makeover, and without her glasses, she's smoking hot.
The guy gets the girl-or the other girl does.
Someone explains a complicated scientific concept, and someone else says, "Um, in English, please?"
The details may change from book to book, but there's nothing truly new under the sun.
Take, for example, the small-town love story.
The kind where a cynical hotshot from New York or Los Angeles gets shipped off to Smalltown, USA-to, like, run a family-owned Christmas tree farm out of business to make room for a soulless corporation.
But while said City Person is in town, things don't go to plan. Because, of course, the Christmas tree farm-or bakery, or whatever the hero's been sent to destroy-is owned and operated by someone ridiculously attractive and suitably available for wooing.
Back in the city, the lead has a romantic partner. Someone ruthless who encourages him to do what he's set out to do and ruin some lives in exchange for that big promotion. He fields calls from her, during which she interrupts him, barking heartless advice from the seat of her Peloton bike.
You can tell she's evil because her hair is an unnatural blond, slicked back à la Sharon Stone in Basic Instinct, and also, she hates Christmas decorations.
As the hero spends more time with the charming baker/seamstress/tree farm . . . person, things change for him. He learns the true meaning of life!
He returns home, transformed by the love of a good woman. There he asks his ice-queen girlfriend to take a walk with him. She gapes, says something like, In these Manolos?
It will be fun, he tells her. On the walk, he might ask her to look up at the stars.
She snaps, You know I can't look up right now! I just got Botox!
And then he realizes: he can't go back to his old life. He doesn't want to! He ends his cold, unsatisfying relationship and proposes to his new sweetheart. (Who needs dating?)
At this point, you find yourself screaming at the book, You don't even know her! What's her middle name, bitch? From across the room, your sister, Libby, hushes you, throws popcorn at your head without lifting her gaze from her own crinkly-covered library book.
And that's why I'm running late to this lunch meeting.
Because that's my life. The trope that governs my days. The archetype over which my details are superimposed.
I'm the city person. Not the one who meets the hot farmer. The other one.
The uptight, manicured literary agent, reading manuscripts from atop her Peloton while a serene beach scene screen saver drifts, unnoticed, across her computer screen.
I'm the one who gets dumped.
I've read this story, and lived it, enough to know it's happening again right now, as I'm weaving through late-afternoon foot traffic in Midtown, my phone clutched to my ear.
He hasn't said it yet, but the hairs on the back of my neck are rising, the pit opening in my stomach as he maneuvers the conversation toward a cartoon-style drop off a cliff.
Grant was only supposed to be in Texas for two weeks, just long enough to help close a deal between his company and the boutique hotel they were trying to acquire outside San Antonio. Having already experienced two post–work trip breakups, I reacted to the news of his trip as if he'd announced he'd joined the navy and was shipping out in the morning.
Libby tried to convince me I was overreacting, but I wasn't surprised when Grant missed our nightly phone call three times in a row, or when he cut two others short. I knew how this ended.
And then, three days ago, hours before his return flight, it happened.
A force majeure intervened to keep him in San Antonio longer than planned. His appendix burst.
Theoretically, I could've booked a flight right then, met him at the hospital. But I was in the middle of a huge sale and needed to be glued to my phone with stable Wi-Fi access. My client was counting on me. This was a life-changing chance for her. And besides, Grant pointed out that an appendectomy was a routine procedure. His exact words were "no big deal."
So I stayed, and deep down, I knew I was releasing Grant to the small-town-romance-novel gods to do with what they do best.
Now, three days later, as I'm practically sprinting to lunch in my Good Luck heels, my knuckles white against my phone, the reverberation of the nail ...
