With every new book, I'm convinced that Emily Henry can do no wrong. This was exactly the kind of book I needed to read right now, with such a beautiful exploration of second-chance romance and friendship and family all set within a cozy cottage town that feels like a warm hug. From the very first page I fell in love with these characters and found parts of myself in each one of them. Moreover, I absolutely loved the way that the author explores adult friendships in this book. This is something that I think isn't talked about enough, especially in the context of a romance novel, and it was at once heartwrenching, validating, and beautiful.

Happy Place was amazing! It was emotional, easy to read, nostalgic, and cozy. I would even go as far as to say that it’s Emily Henry’s best writing and my favorite Emily Henry book (and I love them all). The mixture of fake dating and second-chance romance worked so well, and I couldn’t get enough of the dynamic between Harriet and Wyn.

Honestly, the part I enjoyed the most was the friendship between Harriet and her best friends. I thrive on female friendships, so it was beautiful to see a book where that was celebrated, along with the challenges of what happens to friendships as you get older/live separate lives.

I also loved that Happy Place dove into what it looks like to find what makes you happy and how that can change over time. I could relate to choosing a career path to make others proud instead of making yourself happy, so I’ll be thinking about this book for a while!

I’m for sure buying a physical copy when Happy Place comes out!

I cannot express how much I loved this book. I was up until 4:30am reading it and had to force myself to put it down to sleep. I haven't read a lot of second chance romances and wasn't sure how I would feel about it but it was done so well and it was honestly so relatable--and the TENSION omg I couldn't get enough of it. Also, the found family and all the banter were everything in this book. I laughed and I sobbed and I will probably be making this book my entire personality for awhile.

This is Emily Henry taken to the next level. While the diehard rom-com lover might not be as pleased with this book, it’s worth the read. Happy Place is melancholy, complicated, joyful, and aching. It made me snort with laughter and cry. Emily Henry fans rejoice: your new moody favorite is here!

Emily Henry shines brightest when her unique, idiosyncratic characters are all bouncing off each other, so creating a story with a close-knit ensemble feels like a natural step for her. These characters feel real and lived-in, whose deep connections to each other form the stakes for this story. There are no villains here, just people who have grown up, who discover that what they want now at 30 isn't the same as it was at 21. There's so much to grab onto in this book: whether it's the feeling of drifting away from your long-term partner, or the sudden realization that friendships that feel like a part of your body are no longer working. Add onto it a dreamy cottage in a gorgeous seaside town and you've got the perfect vacation second chance fake dating story.

this was literally AMAZING.

i’ll be rereading again & writing a full review in a bit but all you have to know is that this has book lovers’ banter and beach read’s introspection. not so much a huge rom com like her other books but it’s much more mature and melancholy and UGH there are some passages i teared up at. emily henry truly outdoes herself with every wonderful book she publishes.

This one's for the especially emo Emily Henry girlies.

If I am a sucker for anything, it's a second-chance romance. If there's a trope I'm not a huge fan of, it's fake dating. Somehow, this combo was perfect.

Harriet is a hardworking neurosurgery resident who never wants to make a fuss. Living thousands of miles away from her best friends—Sabrina, dramatic heiress lawyer, and Cleo, chill artistic farmer—she hasn't been able to bring herself pick up the phone and tell either of them that she and Wyn, her fiance and the man she's been with for nearly a decade, are over. He dumped her. Months ago. Now, their annual friends trip to Maine is upon them, and Harriet has decided she has to tell them, to explain why Wyn won't be coming. Except when Harriet shows up to their cottage, she finds out two things: one, this will be their final friends trip in Maine because the cottage is being sold, and two, Wyn is very much coming. In fact, he's already there.

This week, this final trip, has to be perfect—for a variety of reasons. Harriet can't upset her friends by telling them about her and Wyn's breakup. She can't ruin this trip like that. Reluctantly, she and Wyn strike up an agreement to keep the news to themselves until the week is over. What transpires is a tense one-bed situation, a You-Deserve-Each-Other-esque battle between the two, and a whole host of unresolved feelings and unanswered questions.

Based on early descriptions, I was worried I wouldn't connect as well with these characters, but I found them to be deeply relatable. Harriet is a people pleaser who never learned how to fight with her loved ones, to deal with conflict. She shrinks her own needs to suit others. Wyn is a charmer who uses that charm to cover up the fact that he doesn't feel like he's good enough, has never felt like he was good enough. I love them. I love them so much. I want to curl Wyn up in my arms and rock him back and forth. I want to hug Harriet so tight. These two are soulmates, which is obvious from the get-go.

Stylistically and thematically, Happy Place resembles People We Meet On Vacation far more than Beach Read or Book Lovers. Stylistically because for a solid chunk of the novel, we are treated to flashbacks of Harriet and Wyn's relationship—how they met, how they got together, what their life was like. Thematically because I think Harriet struggles with many of the same issues as Poppy—she's achieved the exact thing she's wanted career-wise, and yet she's feeling unfilled; she had this person she cared so deeply about in Wyn and then suddenly that relationship was over; she's struggling between the past and the present, struggling with old friendships and how they change with time. Also, I found Happy Place, while still being a work of women's fiction AND romance, focused more on the romance than the women's fiction aspect (which imo is another similarity with PWMOV and difference from Beach Read and Book Lovers).

What sets Happy Place apart from Emily Henry's other novels is its cast of characters. There is such a solid group of friends in this book! Their desperation to stay together, to remain unchanged even as they all DO change (as people inevitably do with age), is so realistic and relatable.

I loved this book. I read it as an ebook and tend to really struggle with focus when it comes to ereading, so I think I'm going to love it even more when I finally get my hands on a physical copy and reread it.

LIKES:
📝 classically bingeable, hilarious EH writing
⏳ dual-timeline (college through present day)
🌊 set in the coastal New England (Maine)
👩🏻 Harriet is a closed-off, ppl pleasing med student
🧔🏼 Wyn is a self-deprecating, HOT furniture maker
💞 second chance romance (3/5 steam level)
🥸 + fake dating (god tier!!!!)
🗣️ + LITERALLY THE MOST ELITE BANTER
👫 explores the evolution of adult friend groups
👨‍👩‍👧‍👦 + family dynamics
🌱 themes of personal growth
🖤 + grief, loss, & betrayal
🎭 + lots of drama!
🥹 emotional & heartwarming
😌 felt mature & realistic
•
DISCLAIMERS:
⚠️ dm me for TW!
🤔 timelines can get confusing
🏊‍♀️ takes a while to get deep (but ends up deep!)
🤷‍♀️ characters felt very real to me but maybe aren’t as exciting as some of EHs others
•
VERDICT: an IMPECCABLE BANTER-FILLED, hilarious, & (ultimately) emotional second-chance, faking dating romance giving New Girl & coastal grandmother vibes - a slower burn in terms of character development & depth but I ended up loving!

Emily Henry does it again! Old college friends gather again in their “happy place” for a week of fun and heartbreak and revelations. While this book does have a classic love story, what spoke to me was the story of friendships. Readers will love the likable characters and want to be transported as well to Harriet’s vacation and friend group.

Everything Emily Henry writes turns to gold and I am constantly in awe of her ability to capture emotions and make every book feel like it was written just for me, like she crawled into my brain to write exactly what I needed to hear.

I am an avid Emily Henry reader and I thought Happy Place, while utterly beautiful and so distinctly ~Emily Henry~ in her voice and diction, stood out from her others because it feels so different than her other stories. That may be in part because its her first true second chance story, or because of the large cast of characters the book centers on, but I mostly think its because, whereas her other books focus on female protagonists who are confident in their dreams and are trying to hold on to and/or find a way back to them, the thing that they know makes them happy, Happy Place is a story about letting go - of inhibitions, of expectations, of so-called dreams, of a life that no longer suits you. And by letting go, that’s when you can find your truest, happiest self. That is a message that spoke to me, that I felt in my heart, mind, and soul.

On a scale of Beach Read (angst) to People We Meet On Vacation (rom-com), if Book Lovers falls in the middle but closer to Beach Read, then Happy Place falls in the middle closer to PWMOV. Happy Place has everything you’d expect and love in an Emily Henry book - witty banter, immaculate chemistry, a lovable hero who you just want to hug and tell them everything will be okay, a strong-willed heroine who feels like was written specifically for you, well thought-out and engaging characters beautifully navigating through struggle, grief, life changes, and complex relationships. It was emotional, it was heartfelt, it was joyful, it was heartbreaking, it was moving. It felt like a true labor of love that Emily Henry is kind enough to gift to us.

Harriet is the most mirrorball girlie to have ever mirrorballed and I cried for the last 30% of this book because of her and her beautiful, nightmare, soft, soft, people-pleaser brain. She deserves happiness more than anyone I know. Wyn, my sweet Wyn, is the ultimate golden boy on the outside (which was such a change for a EH hero, I was thrown at first glance) but was so, SO damaged on the inside (this tracks for Miss Henry - thank you for giving the people what we want). He was a character I both loved and was completely frustrated by because I couldn’t peg him. His character, flaws, demons, insecurities and all, were revealed so slowly, bit by bit throughout the book that it really took nearly the whole story for me to understand him and his actions. But once I did, it was a complete game-changer, like the missing puzzle piece that unlocked Emily Henry’s grand masterpiece and made me see the whole story in a new light. At one point Harriet makes a joke that she’s slow-release hot… Wyn is slow-release TRAUMA (and I obviously loved every second of it).

Emily Henry is truly a master at her craft and, while it hurts a large part of me to feel all the feelings she invokes (something I usually try to avoid), I am grateful to her for capturing certain emotions that I thought were indescribable and seemingly always finding a way to tell me exactly what I need to hear. I look forward to reading everything she writes in the future, including her grocery lists.

Thank you so SO much for Berkley Publishing and NetGalley for the ARC of Happy Place!

It’s hard to not like an Emily Henry book, but I did feel that this was the slowest paced and least engaging of hers so far. However, I think that could also be due to the fact that it is a second chance romance. I felt that this book focused less on romance and more on their friendship dynamics and learning to navigate your relationships with other people. I do think that this was the most realistic relationship conflict and breakup reason I have ever read in a romance novel, but I did not feel a propelling romantic thread throughout this book that made me excited to keep moving forward. That being said, I enjoyed this and thought it handled the tropes well, I just don’t think they are the tropes for me.

Emily Henry has such a gift for capturing emotions with the kind of breathtaking exactness that makes you go, "Yes! That is exactly how that feels." She is in her full glory here in HAPPY PLACE, walking us through the myriad of ways we grow and change in our thirties and how sometimes you can grow apart from someone only to grow back together even stronger. It's a poignant, beautiful story told by a writer at the top of her game. How lucky we are to live in the time of Emily Henry's greatness!

As a Mainer, how could I not love an Emily Henry book set in a Maine vacation house? Harriet and Wyn have always been the perfect couple since they crossed that fateful line from friends to lovers. They have a group of friends that have become the definition of found family. They even all take a yearly vacation to a cottage on the coast of Maine. Unfortunately, this year Wyn and Harriet are no longer together and no one else knows. But when the group finds out that the “happy place” is being sold, they decide to hold off on announcing their breakup in effort to make it a memorable last hurrah. After dating for nearly a decade, Wyn and Harriet should easily be able to fake it, right? It's just a week. They can hold it together for one week... right?


It took me a few chapters to really feel like I was connecting to the characters. It was still enjoyable to read but I didn't feel completely glued to the story. BUT then I started to get a better feel for Harriet and became more invested. I did eventually get to a point where I did not want to put it down. The emotions brought forward by Wyn and Harriet are beautiful though. The dual timeline really allows for you feel the intense attraction when they met and then fell in love, etc; but also feel the heartbreak of their distance when arriving at the cottage. And of course, with a setup like this there is obviously a one bed trope to up the ante on the fake dating/forced prox/second chance aspects. Some other themes that felt important to mention were grief, facing your fears, finding yourself and the roller-coaster of emotions that accompany growing up. There was also a great mental health rep.

Overall, it was a great read and I enjoyed it!
I am extremely thankful that Netgalley and Berkley Publishing gave me an advanced copy in exchange for my honest opinion <3

Thank you to Berkley and Netgalley for an ARC in exchange of a fair review.

All the hearts and feels! I adored this book. Henry keeps to her past/present formats of other novels. I adored the premise and characters. Wyn is definitely a new, dreamy book boyfriend for 2023. The narrative nicely deals with relationship ups and downs, changing friendships and managing adulting.

I love Emily Henry, with Beach Read and Book Lovers being two of my favorite romance novels to date, so I had high expectations for this one. I had a hard time connecting with any of the characters, who all seemed bad at communicating and a bit entitled. The breakup between Harriet and Wyn felt particularly implausible, and I wasn't convinced that they would've broken up in the first place. Even Harriet's troubles with her job seemed overblown. Plus everyone drank too much! Overall, still an enjoyable read, just didn't live up to my expectations.

Thank you to NetGalley and Berkley Publishing Group for an advanced reader copy of Happy Place.

Harriet can't wait to join her friends at their yearly Maine vacation, she hasn't seen them in a while and has some news. Her and her fiance Wyn, another member of the friend group, are no longer together. Color her surprised when she walks into the house and sees Wyn.

They have to get through the week and convince their closest friends they are still very much in love. Should be easy right? Too bad Harriet is furious with Wyn and still doesn't fully understand what happened with their relationship.

I loved this read! Emily Henry delves into Harriet and Wyn's relationship and also all the friendships in the group. It made me want to call all my friends and tell them I love them. Communication is a huge storyline in this novel. Harriet would have avoided so much pain if she would have talked to people and not made assumptions. It deals with mental health in a quiet way. The characters are growing up and still trying to stay connected.

I tried so hard to not flip to the end and ruin the ending for myself. And I'm glad I didn't! I don't want to give any spoilers so I won't go too into plot.

But I want to give Wyn a big hug, and tell Harriet she does deserve to be happy!

there was no doubt about this one. i'm absolutely convinced EH wrote this for me and the ones who suffer in silence, the ones who are closer to their friends than they are with their family and siblings, the ones who will do anything to make others proud of them. the people pleasers and the quiet romantics, the ones who ache to be seen for who they really are and how they truly feel. she wrote it for the ones who center love in their life but have never had love centered for them and the younger siblings who had to pick up the pieces and shoulder the responsibilities, the weights, and the burdens of unspoken trauma. in Wyn, she wrote the ones who feel lost, struggling to fit into a world that prioritizes "passions" and "go-getters", the ones who love the little things about life, the ones who don't feel like they deserve anything special, and the ones who never feel like they're enough. and lastly, Happy Place is such a beautiful romance novel but it also captures the love and magic of platonic love. the depth of a friendship so beautiful, you know they were a part of your soul in another life and will have a piece of your heart for the rest of this one. this was truly so well done.

This is one of those "devour in as few sittings as humanly possible" blissful vacation reads, which is what I'm always looking for with Emily Henry. I found it a little annoying at first that every single character is beautiful and rich and had that perfect-with-one-endearing-quirk energy that usually comes with the territory of less-good romance novels, and I also found the overall conceit hard to swallow in the first several chapters. However, EH won me over in the end, as she always does. I also think--much like most of her other books--that this would make a great movie, but it doesn't have the annoying "written to be a movie" vibe.

I adored everything about this book. The back and forth from present to past fit perfectly with everything happening in the story, and I found all of the characters to be very multidimensional. Even with the conflict, the relationships between all of the characters felt very strong and well-developed, and I loved the way Harriet, Sabrina and Cleo’s friendship was portrayed.

Oh my god. Her best yet. I usually try to read my net galley ARCs in order of publication date but I could not hold myself back and I'm NOT SORRY. This book broke my heart and put it back together. I have zero complaints, suggestions, or tweaks. I just wish I could read it again for the first time.

Things I loved: realistic, devastating depiction of grief, found beloved family, complicated, changing friend groups/dynamics, emotionally complicated (but not stunted) male protagonist, emotionally complicated female protagonist who has to figure out what she actually wants out of life, happy endings not necessarily looking like you thought they would.

I have to stop writing because I'm crying again.

Thanks to NetGalley and Berkley for the free ARC in exchange for an honest review.