Absolutely fantastic! Could not put the book down once I began reading it. Cannot wait for it to be released. Will recommend it to everyone I know!

Having loved THE SCENT KEEPER, I was excited to read Erica Bauermeister’s new book, NO TWO PERSONS. If I could rate the cover, I would give it five+ stars. It is gorgeous and is perfect for this story. When I taught a high school literature class, we discussed why each person reads a book differently (life experiences, interests, different stages of life…). Bauermeister explores this with the nine characters who come in contact with Alice’s book, THEO. I enjoyed and laughed how the Assistant, Lara, tried to cope with trying to keep up with her job reading manuscripts while breastfeeding…..I struggled with the rest of the book which read like an anthology of readers who somehow came in contact with “Theo.” I did enjoy “The Artist” and I really found myself needing to breathe after “The Diver.” I struggled for most of the book as my mind wondered. Maybe, at another time in my life, this reader would feel differently.
Cover: 5+ stars. Story: 3 stars. Overall: 4 stars. My thanks to St. Martin’s Press and NetGalley for an ARC of this book. The opinions in this review are my own.

This novel once again showcases Bauermeister’s signature style of character studies told in short stories with a common thread. In this case, the people who read a particular novel, Theo, beginning with the author’s who writes it, to the agent that publicizes it, to the audio actor who records it, and then to various other people who read it. At each point in the lives of the people encountering the book, they take something different away from it. This is the essence of the title, that no two people will see the same story in the same way. The author has a gift for character development, fully fleshing out her characters in the space of a short story, yet the reader is drawn into their thoughts and feelings. As the book progresses, some of the characters cross paths, and Theo becomes a point of commonality. The plot of Theo is slowly revealed as different people identify with different aspects of that story. An interesting premise, and nicely written.

What an interesting format for a novel. It is almost short stories about different people, with one exception, the same book touches them all in different ways. The story evokes empathy for the characters and an understanding of the difficulties they are living through but at the same time there is hope in the form of a book.

Unquestionably a novel everyone should pick up and read and is best entering into not knowing very much.

Thank you @stmartinspress and @ericabauermeister for my prize copy of this. Also @netgalley for providing me with an advanced ecopy. @knightedbooks I hope you enjoyed it as much as I did.

What an interesting book. The idea that no two people read the same book is fascinating to me...and something I agree with. How is it possible for some people to give a book 5 stars and others give it 1 star? Because we are all individuals and we all grasp different parts of a book and a story. Certain things resonate more with me than others and vice versa. I loved how this book was a bunch of shorter stories all connected to the same book. I thought it was very well written and a fascinating take on storytelling.

Thank you Netgalley for my advanced reader copy.

"No two persons ever read the same book or saw the same pictures”
The Writings of Madame Swetchine, 1860

Beautiful. Absolutely beautiful. I’ve read plenty of books that made my heart ache, but very few that made my heart feel seen. There is something remarkably soothing about No Two Persons, this quiet novel told in vignettes. From beginning to end, one thought rang in me, heart, mind, and soul: “Ah. There you are.” I can’t articulate how it made me feel. The feeling it inspired isn’t big or showy, but it’s a feeling I’ve been seeking my entire life. Whatever that feeling may be, I’m incredibly thankful to have experienced it. And I hope other readers will have the same healing, soothing, quiet experience of being seen by what you love.

“I think each story has its own life. In the beginning, it lives in the writer’s mind, and it grows and changes while it’s there. Changes the writer, too, I’d bet… At some point it’s written down, and that’s the book readers hold in their hands. But the story isn’t done, because it goes on the live in the readers’ heads, in a way that’s particular to each of them. We’re all caretakers of the stories, Alice. Writers are just the lucky ones that get to know them first.”

The storytelling here is exceptional, and feels very unique. We follow a different person in each chapter, who are only bound together by their experience with a particular book, Theo, penned by the first character we meet. I would have bought this entire book for that first section alone, which said some brilliant things about stories and storytelling. But each perspective with engaging and insightful, and I was blown away by how brilliantly drawn and lifelike I found each of these individuals. And even though these characters are all radically different in every way, there began to be surprising connections between them further into the book. The story is a tapestry, tying the characters together in interesting, sometimes cyclical ways. Not only are there shared experiences between these characters and the titular character of the book that binds them, but some of them actually impact the story of another in small, unexpected, meaningful ways.

“Sometimes what she wrote felt more real than truth. But maybe that’s what writing was, in the end—a way to get to the bedrock, the oxygen. To search out the possible.”

I love books that make me feel, and this book definitely made me feel things. I wanted nothing more than to reach into the book and pull out my own copy of Theo, to see how the story that was so impactful for these characters might also impact me. I also love how the title comes into play, how no two of these characters experience Theo the same way or draw the same things from its pages. But not one of them is left unchanged by it.

“Wandering is a gift given only to the lost.”

“Inspiration.
Because wasn’t that what art was all about, in the end? Mentally shoplifting your way through the world around you, the thoughts inside you? Looking for the thing that makes it all click. Makes it all start. Makes it all worthwhile and whole and good again.
That could take a while. You might have to wander, but that didn’t mean you were lost.”

This is exactly what I’m always subconsciously hoping to find whenever I pick up a book about books. No Two Persons is all about the power of story to reveal and connect and heal, and how that journey can be radically different for each person who picks up the same book. And that emphasis on the importance of story, particular this one specific story, is the binding element of the entire work. Some books proclaim themselves to be a “love letter to book lovers” or an “ode to the power of story,” but they almost without fail forsake that promise as the plot takes over. Not so with No Two Persons. The book within this book is the plot, and nothing ever usurps it. Because it’s a quiet, thoughtful, meditative work, I don’t know that it will sing into the soul of every reader as it did mine. But that’s the entire point of the story here. No two persons ever read the same book in the same way. I’m just incredibly thankful to have experienced it in the way that I did. It’s my favorite book I’ve read all year.

⭐️⭐️⭐️⭐️
🌶️🌶️

I loved this novel! All the chapters center a different character, with the book "Theo" as a common thread among them, creating a wonderful web of stories. Each was so well crafted that I slowed my reading pace to savor the limited time I had with each. Thank you NetGalley, Erica Bauermeister, and St. Martin’s Press for this Advanced Reader’s Copy in exchange for an honest review of No Two Persons (coming out May 2nd!)



For 2023, I’ll be using this rating scale:
⭐️⭐️⭐️⭐️⭐️ I mourned the ending of this journey 🥹
⭐️⭐️⭐️⭐️ really enjoyed and would recommend
⭐️⭐️⭐️ it was fine
⭐️⭐️ I didn’t enjoy this journey
⭐️ I dnf’d or wish I’d dnf’d
🌶️🌶️🌶️🌶️🌶️ this is smutty smutty erotica 🥵
🌶️🌶️🌶️🌶️ medium burn
🌶️🌶️🌶️ slow burn
🌶️🌶️ romantic b plot / closed door / YA romance
🌶️ no romance / nonfiction

I loved this one. It was fascinating to see how the book - both the written words and the actual book itself - affect different people in different ways. And then the beautiful way that Bauermeister wove the readers' stories together - so good. There was just enough about each character to be left wondering a little, and then later to see the interconnection. It reminded me of

“Books spoke to specific people for specific reasons, and it had everything to do with where they were in their lives”


Oh…my….god. This book.
I have no words.


Let’s start by saying this quote is perfect, and I completely agree. Sometimes I’ll read a book, and love it, and I’ll take a message from it that other people may not.


This book is made for people who love books, and love the experience of reading a beautiful book. When I finished, I closed it, and just started at nowhere thinking of all the books that have brought me comfort, insights, and lessons. I’m grateful for all of them.


Alice is a quiet and shy person who always dreamed of writing a book.
She suddenly has a vision, and the words just come at her. After polishing the words, and being rejected by various publishers, her book finally gets published.


Each chapter is about a person who’s been touched by Alice’s book.
And they’re beautiful stories, about broken people, going through something personal in their lives.


Highly recommend this book!

Has a book ever spoke directly to your soul?

I can think of a few books that I was reading during a pivotal time in my life, and they profoundly affected me. No Two Persons explores exactly that- the phenomenon of the power of a book, and how it can affect us differently.

This book was like a love letter to readers and writers. It is beautifully written and a memorable story. I love books where multiple characters. This book is perfect for readers who enjoy multiple points of view, beautiful writing, and the power of a good book.

A sincere thank you to St. Martin’s Press and netgalley for the electronic arc of No Two Persons.

Yes!! Just....yes!

No Two Persons by Erica Bauermeister is the story of an aspiring author who finally has a breakthrough after a traumatic event in her life and is able to produce a novel that gets published. We follow this novel from the author's hands to the literary assistant, the actor, the artist, the diver, the teenager, the bookseller, the caretaker, the coordinator, and finally the agent. Each chapter is from the point of view of the person who has somehow acquired the book, almost as if by fate, and how the book impacts their life. "One book, nine readers, ten changed lives."

This book is beautifully written and I did not want it to end. From someone who deeply loves books and reading I had a great appreciation for this story. I know I have personally had books that have affected me on otherworldly levels and I'm always quick to recommend these to my friends and family. This book will definitely be one of my top recommendations to other book lovers.

This was a very well-written story. I loved how people of all different walks of life were connected by a single book and believe this to be true in life. A couple of the stories left me wanting more, was glad to revisit Nola at the end.

For anyone who loves books and reading, you will enjoy this novel which honors the differing ways that readers respond to a single story. You will recognize yourself in at least one of the characters portrayed in the chapters, with each chapter featuring a person's relationship to the book that is central to the book. Each story drew me emotionally into the character's life, and I even cried at a couple of particularly heart wrenching moments.

My only criticism is that the book felt more like a series of short stories than an integrated novel. While there was some overlap or integration of the characters between the stories, it was minimal, and had I not been looking for it, may have been missed.

Thank you to Netgalley and St. Martin's Press for the digital ARC of No Two Persons by Erica Bauermeister. The opinions in this review are my own.

Talented, ever-evolving novelist Erica Bauermeister offers a masterful story in NO TWO PERSONS. Throughout the lifetime of a story, from its inception and writing by a debut novelist through the agents, readers, and others who encounter the book in its every stage of publication, the story sparkles, fascinates, delights with the unique ways each person engages with a beautifully written, heartbreaking story. Through perspectives of magnificently vivid and convincing individuals, I lived the impact of a great story well told. A standing ovation to a writer who never fails to provide the ultimate in engaging, uplifting, realistic stories! I received a copy of this book and these opinions are my own, unbiased thoughts.

Emotionally resonant and profound, No Two Persons is a love letter to readers and writers alike, and my goodness, did it speak to my book lover's soul.

Every reader has those books that just seem to come to us at the right time in our lives -- the books that not only transport us to another world, but to the people we were when we first read them. And the special power of stories is that no two readers will read the same book in the same way, which is the phenomenon that Erica Bauermeister explores so beautifully in No Two Persons.

A novel told in a series of interconnected short stories, we are introduced first to Alice, a young writer who pens Theo after a devastating event in her life causes her to pour her heart out onto the page. From there, we meet nine of Theo's readers who pick up the book at important moments in their lives. Rather than utilizing a "story within a story" structure, we only learn about the plot of Theo through the perspectives of its readers and the specific insights they take away from the story. From a new mother trying to balance parenthood and her career, to a homeless teenager, to a bereft widower, to a former actor forging a new path, to a lauded agent facing an unexpected diagnosis, each reader comes at Theo from a different perspective, and each gleans a new insight or path forward from its pages.

No Two Persons is not only a book about the power of stories, but about the power of emotional connection and the wide range of the human experience. It's an intimate, vulnerable, and compelling character study, relayed in luminous prose, with characters that are well-developed and relatable. It's a book about the invisible connections and the tiny threads that weave us all together and it is simply, in a word, lovely.

I was fortunate to receive both audio and digital copies of this wonderful novel, so I switched back and forth between the two mediums. The audiobook is read brilliantly by a full cast, with a different narrator for each character, which just adds to the intimacy and sense of connection this story conveys. Thank you to St. Martin's Press, Macmillan Audio, and NetGalley for the advance reading opportunity.

Thank you, Erica Bauermeister, St. Martin's Press, and Netgalley for the gifted eARC.

Since she was a child, Alice knew she wanted to write books. In college, she took classes for writing, but all of her stories were missing something. Then something happens in her life that completely breaks her. To help her process, she sits down and writes a book. This book finds its way into the hands of readers who need her words the most.

In No Two Persons, you meet a new character, each chapter who is facing some type of difficulty or a time of change in their life. Somehow, they end up reading the book Theo that was written by Alice. The book effects them and changes their life in some way. We don't get to know these characters very long, just brief glimpses into their lives. Due to this, there is very little character development, and I felt no connection to any of the characters. Each character story doesn't end in a nice wrapped up way either. There's no nice way to say it, but this book was really a hot mess. It was more like a series of short stories compiled into one but stories without real substance. Some character stories were interconnected to try to make it one cohesive book, but many stories weren't. There's also really no big fulfilling moment in this book. This is one of those books that is just isn't going to leave a lasting impression on me.

There are really good books, great books even, and then there are those special, next-level books— which is the category where No Two Persons falls. Thank you @stmartinspress and @netgalley for the early look. I feel so honored to have gotten a sneak peek at this beauty. It’s out on Tuesday.

I have always loved the quote ‘No two persons has ever read the same book,’ which is what initially drew me to this, and made me want to request the advanced copy, and I’m so happy I did. This book reads like a love song to readers; it takes everything we adore about books and actually puts words to it. I was enamored and captivated from the first page and couldn’t put it down.

This is largely character driven which is normally not my thing but I just adored every story told, every person’s journey to this book and what it meant to them, what it helped them see. It gave me serious Cloud Cuckoo Land vibes, but in a much smaller, more manageable package.

Read if you’ve ever…
- felt seen when reading
- explained a book plot as passionately as if it happened in real life
- wanted to devour a book and never have it end at the same time

Read if you like…
- Tomorrow And Tomorrow And Tomorrow
- Cloud Cuckoo Land
- The Reading List

If you’re in this space, I assume you love reading. And if you love reading, I have no doubt you’ll love this book in particular. It’s by far my favorite book I read this month, and I can see it being in the top books I’ve read this year.

What a unique reading experience. The novel “Theo” passes through a vast array of people – writer assistant, actor, artist, diver, teenager, bookseller, caretaker, coordinator, and the agent. The effect for each person differs as much as the people do. Pretty much each chapter introduces us to a new experience relating to the book “Theo”. I was eager to see who would discover the book next and how it would affect their life. Beautifully written and thought provoking. A very character driven story.

Thank you St Martin's for No Two Persons (also macmillan audio for the audiobook version). This is a charming hopeful book, a loving ode not just to books but to how stories, words, characters matter in unexpected ways. I loved how this story took it's time to tell not just the story of a writer and her book but then how the book impacted so many different readers. I loved how each character's story/chapter was their own story but how the common theme was their unexpected discovery of Theo (the book within the book) and, deep down, it was about how we find hope, creative sparks, and new beginnings when we read and when the right book finds us at the right time.
I am so excited to make this a book club choice, I think it will be a great book to chat about with fellow book lovers.
Recommended for fans of books similar to Dear Edward, The People We Keep (stories that are unexpectedly hopeful even with the edges of sadness layered in).

Description:
“One book. Nine readers. Ten changed lives. New York Times bestselling author Erica Bauermeister’s No Two Persons is ‘a gloriously original celebration of fiction, and the ways it deepens our lives.’”

Five pages into #NoTwoPersons by EricaBauermeister, I texted my sister and told her to add this book to her TBR. I knew immediately that it was a five-star read; that was going to stay with me for a long time.

I have been a book lover since I learned to read. There is nothing like a book. It can be a magic portal into another world, an escape from this one, a way to stave off boredom or discomfort or loneliness. The right book can be a voice in the dark telling you that you are not alone, a teacher, a best friend. No Two Persons reflects those feelings back in a love letter to readers.

In No Two Persons, Alice knows that she has a book in her, and she writes and writes. Though she’s an excellent writer, her stories lack feeling, they’re detached. It is after suffering a great loss, that she finds the story she was meant to write, and when it is released into the world, it has a profound effect on the people who read it. A grieving widow, an exhausted new mother, a homeless teenager, and even the editor who saves the book from the slush pile are touched and forever changed, each in his or her own way.

No two persons ever read the same book, and yet they can have a deep effect on all of us. This one certainly did for me. The writing was gorgeous, the characters were robust, and I loved the way the author wove characters in and out of each other’s lives throughout the book.

I strongly recommend this book to everyone! It’s definitely a top favorite for the year.

Thank you to @NetGalley @ericabauermeisterauthor and @stmartinspress for the advanced reader copy in exchange for my honest opinion.