Beach Read: A Realistic Romance Novel That Will Leave You Wanting More

I picked up this book after a difficult period. I was already reading the third book in a fantasy series and a collection of short stories, but deep down, I felt as if I needed something else in that particular moment of my life. Something mundane and real, but at the same time something that is not my life. In times like that, I reach out to comfort reads, and for me those are contemporary romance. I know, cliche, but a few years ago I started the quest of searching for “good” romance books. It's a difficult and unproductive journey for my practical mind.

I am familiar with the general purpose of romance books. It’s a daydream of love. Or, let's be honest, some of us need the spicier books for other reasons. This is all acceptable and fine. But more often than not, the romance novels I pick up focus solely on the romance. I know it sounds logical, but also shallow and unsatisfying.

Romance novels can be so much more than exchanging kisses on cute locations or “I want to devour you” sex scenes. Real romance, at least for me, is the one that’s entwined with our lives, with who we are, and driven by feelings that are more than physical attraction, lust, or the love-struck honeymoon phase of a new relationship. This is where romance books often fall short.

So picking “Beach read” was another attempt for me to find a romance novel with complex characters. I had already read "People we meet on vacation" from Emily Henry, and it didn't leave a strong impression on me. Like okay, characters are deeper than in your usual romance novel, but cliche moments, tropes and already seen scenes were just not that good. So when I picked up “Beach read” I expected that or worse, since this is Emily Henry’s older novel. And I can say, given my expectations, I found the book to be a pleasant surprise.

Beach Read: The Story (with spoilers and comments)

It’s needles to say that we have a classic grumpy meets sunshine trope in play. But with a twist, since January was a sunshine before her father died. With a letter and key in hand, his mistress arrived at his funeral. A year later, January uses that same key and moving into the secret house where her father lived with his mistress.

January's life is in ruins, financially and emotionally. And during this period of book that we get to know her, who she was before and who is she now, we can still somehow feel the old January below all of this. She is desperate, depressed and pessimistic, but still she has this will to live despite all of it. Not everyone can handle things like that and keep their real positive nature lurking beneath.

Then, after January moved to the house which she despised, she met the grumpy neighbour. Augustus Everett, her college rival from years ago, ignited both hidden desire and inexplicable animosity within her back when they were in college. Here's another cliché, a classic "fate" moment, but not overly cheesy. The plot takes place near the University of Michigan, where both of them attended, with Gus being a townie, etc. The fact that he owned a house next to her father is a bit stretched, but could easily be realistic in real life.

Here at this point they often bump into each other (they can literally see each other through the window) and eventually they strike a bet. Since January is a romance writer and Gus is a literary fiction writer, they have had some discrepancies at the beginning. January is protective about writing romance and understandably so, because, let’s be real, this kind of novels get the mocking laughs and huffs, usually from men. They are both in a writers block and basically broke, so they strike a bet that they will write the opposite - January will write something more real and without a happy ending, and Gus will write romance. For that, they agreed to spend Fridays and Saturdays doing research together. Honestly, this part felt the most like the usual too unrealistic cliche moment of romance novels. Striking a bet is my biggest ick of romance novels. Have you ever made a bet as an adult, let alone with a sexy neighbor?

Anyway, the bet was also somehow justified. They both struggled to write anything, and they had literally nothing else to do, so I let that slide. The relationship that followed was a mix of beauty and realism. The most unrealistic moments for me were the ones where they had some physical, sexual encounters and were usually interrupted (there were a few), and after they just continued to be friendly and do things together like nothing happened. The amount of overthinking, the nagging questions and the tension eventually result in someone asking the damn question. That seemed most unrealistic to me in the entire book. The rest of their relationship was very nice - the growing friendship, the writing support, the talks. Oh my, how happy I was with the fact that they actually talked to each other, shared they childhoods, discussed the differences, the fears, expectations. Like real people do and should do if they don’t for some reason. Thank you, Emily, for representing a healthy relationship between two people despite all the traumas and setbacks both of them had in life. And they both had them, either Gus with an abusive father and January with her mom’s cancer and dad’s infidelity.

In the end, there was the typical obstacle that every couple faces in classic romance novels, another cliche, but executed effectively once more. When January and Gus do the interview in a local bookstore, his ex wife appears. This sets January running home because she reflects this situation on the one between her mother, father, and his mistress. Because, technically, Gus was still married. And, how it usually goes, the day goes more south when her dad’s mistress is at her door and is determined to talk to January after all the avoiding. Then she finally reads the letter her father left her with the keys. She founds more letters her father wrote to her and goes to his boat she never knew existed. She’s both broken and healed after that. Meanwhile, Gus went AWOL after his ex showed up at the bookstore, so there was no usual happy-ending-running-after-her moment. Well, it was, but after a while passed and he came to her door. They almost missed each other, with rain pouring all the while, of course. Here they had their slow rain-dance, which they mocked throughout the entire book, cliche but also not quite.

The healthiest thing comes here, where Gus told her he went for a drink with his ex after the book store interview. The ex wanted him back, and he admitted he thought about it. And let’s be real, in real life, things would probably go like that. Then he also told January the truth, romantic but not too much (if you forget the pouring rain) that he sees himself with her and not his ex wife, and that there are no happy endings but happy-nows, which I find mostly true in real life. Because life had only one ending, and everything in between are moments.

At the end, they read each other’s books. Honestly, here I expected everything to go to shit, romantically speaking. I expected Gus to write a full-blown romance novel about how he loved January back in college and for her to melt down and whatnot. But again, Emily didn’t disappoint. They both wrote books unrelated to their lives, but with bits and pieces they learned from each other. And that was beautiful. Not cheesy, not cliche, but beautiful.

So yeah, I was expecting a classic, shallow romance novel, and I got a realistic love story. The amount of justified clichés, complex characters, and general realistic situations in this book restored some hope in my quest to find "good" romance novels.Because at the end of the day, don't we all need a bit of cliches in our lives?