This was so cute! Normally I hate dual timeline books, but I didn't mind at all in this one. The only thing about it is I do feel like even when they were ages 16-18 in the flashbacks, the writing felt a bit juvenile for how most people that age talk.

Other than that, this was really a very adorable romance. A nice balance of spice and a really strong slow burn! I love the world of academia as a setting since it hasn't been overdone in the genre yet, it was really refreshing. I do wish they touched a little bit more on what Teddy did in the years leading up to their reunion and how his relationship and subsequent breakup with Mindy went, especially considering that the Mindy storyline was sort of part of the "hook" in the first chapter to get you interested.

4/5 :)

I love a good second chance romance! Were the reasons for the initial breakup a little flimsy? Yes, I won't lie. But I did enjoy the "now" and "then" chapters. And honestly, a lot of stable relationships are built on friendship so good for them.

I really enjoyed reading this book and I loved it from start to finish. I love books where it take place in a past and present version. I loved the characters and how the story came along together. This book is similar to Every Summer After by Carley Fortune and Love and Other Words by Christina Lauren so if you were a fan I definitely recommend this book! Solid 5 stars for me! Thank You NetGalley and St. Martin’s Press for an early copy of this book for my honest review. Publishing Date of August 27, 2024.

“Sometimes people drift apart because the timing’s not right, but if they’re meant to be together, they find their way back to each other in the end.”
This book hit me right where it hurt, and at the perfect time.
As always, I enjoy a woman in a STEM romance novel, and I enjoyed Given Our History!! With main characters that make you want to shake them a little and a love that spans over a decade of missed chances, readers will love Clara and Teddy's story! A little more miscommunication than was at all needed

This was SO CUTE!!! Full of nostalgia and longing and so much fluff. This book felt like a warm hug.

This book also felt like it was MADE for me. As a person from Maryland who went to UMD and is not much older than the FMC, so much of Clara’s childhood felt personal.

I’m not usually drawn to second chance romances but this was so so so cute!! I am immediately picking up her other novel. I loved this!! This was such a soft and sweet read.

Ah, a romance for the ages! Childhood friends that reconnect later in life, with a bit of a long distance friendship going on too. This book asks the whole "what if" question people might come across in their life. What if they had a romance with the one that got away?

This book has duo timelines with the past and present, split between how their friendship started and where they are at today. I loved seeing their relationship develop over the years, even if it was long distance, and some of the interactions were so cute and made my heart feel warm. Of course, they were kids and made mistakes too, but that is what growing up is about.

Along with their relationship, this book talked about these kids being homeschooled and what their experiences after homeschooling was like. It is a detail smaller than the relationship, but it was interesting and I feel like I learned something from it! The main character does touch on some of the hardships, but she also went out and did all the things that non-homeschool kids can do (like get a PHD). There were a couple times where people made comments about homeschooling not being "good enough" despite going through an accredited program, and comments like that helped the main character make some tough decisions about her job. The homeschooling also gave her a chance to meet her best friend and the boy of the story too, so it does play a decent part!

There is a bit of spice to the story, but not too much. There is sex, but it does not go super into detail and it is over relatively quick. The characters consent, use protection, and even talked about using a vibrator to feel more comfortable in the bedroom. Small details like this make a story feel more realistic! Plus, I don't feel like these two scenes took away from the story - it was a culmination of this relationship, and showed how their feelings for one another changed.

Overall, I thought this was a sweet romance and I loved watching it develop over such a period of time. I am always interested in "what if" stories that get me thinking about my own life (and how I would not date anyone from my past), and I am a sucker for a good childhood-friends-to-lovers story. The romance has a slow build with no over-the-top gestures, but there is a kind of third act breakup leading to the final resolution. If you enjoy romances, then I would say to give this one a try!
Content warnings: loss of a parent, heart attack, sexual content, cursing

Given Our History was such a sweet read! I'm a sucker for a second chance romance and absolutely loved everything about this!

This was such a cute romance! Loved the dual timelines and it was easy to love the two main characters. This story is a good reminder to not dwell on the past & to look forward to the future

Loved the structure of this book, switching between past and present and revealing some things before describing how they happened. I’m a sucker for the academics setting. The complications in their relationship felt authentic to the period of their lives (high school through grad school). And I enjoyed the physical romance scenes. Some scenes from Teddy's point of view might have made it even better but I really enjoyed it. Maybe a touch more exploration or acknowledgment of how they might have changed or the relationship experience they each had in the intervening years could have also made a very good book even just a bit greater. I’d give it 4.5 stars if I could.

Thank you to NetGalley/the publisher for an ARC of this title.

I wish I had been able to get into "Given Our History", but despite the charming premise, I never grew attached to the characters enough and struggled to finish the book.

Perhaps I am not fond of back-and-forth flashback structures.

The writing was fine, but not remarkable.

This story was about a second chance romance with childhood friends that had miscommunication the first go around. Kristyn had a good job of interconnecting the story lines between the past and present. Was able to complete within one sitting as the story line was a breezy read with some depth.

➸ 3 stars

“Sometimes people drift apart because the timing’s not right, but if they’re meant to be together, they find their way back to each other in the end.”

Thank you to Netgalley for the arc!!

Second chance romances are one of my favorite tropes when done right, and this one was… okay! I didn’t enjoy it as much as I thought I would have mainly because I wasn’t really engaged in the story. It started off great but I felt like over the span of 300ish, pages nothing really happened at all and I just wasn’t hooked…

🍂 𝐬𝐞𝐜𝐨𝐧𝐝 𝐜𝐡𝐚𝐧𝐜𝐞
🍂 𝐫𝐢𝐠𝐡𝐭 𝐩𝐞𝐫𝐬𝐨𝐧, 𝐰𝐫𝐨𝐧𝐠 𝐭𝐢𝐦𝐞
🍂 𝐩𝐚𝐬𝐭/𝐩𝐫𝐞𝐬𝐞𝐧𝐭 𝐜𝐡𝐚𝐩𝐭𝐞𝐫𝐬
🍂 𝐜𝐡𝐢𝐥𝐝𝐡𝐨𝐨𝐝 𝐟𝐫𝐢𝐞𝐧𝐝𝐬 𝐭𝐨 𝐥𝐨𝐯𝐞𝐫𝐬
🍂 𝐦𝐢𝐬𝐜𝐨𝐦𝐦𝐮𝐧𝐢𝐜𝐚𝐭𝐢𝐨𝐧
🍂 𝐜𝐨𝐥𝐥𝐞𝐠𝐞 𝐬𝐞𝐭𝐭𝐢𝐧𝐠

“We’ve been apart longer than we were ever friends.”

➸ clara - there wasn’t anything I disliked about her… but there also wasn’t anything I liked. her character kind of fell flat for me and her reasoning for not wanting to be with teddy annoyed me because she never even tried!

➸ teddy - I liked him I guess, I think maybe adding his pov would’ve added more to the story; having some insight on how he felt towards clara would have been cute since it was so obvious he loved her!! one thing I would’ve liked more touch on was his kind of recent 6 year relationship; it was kind of just mentioned and that was all there was to it… what went on there? why did it end? 6 years is a LONG time and if I were Clara I would’ve been so curious as to what happened…

“Except in all the ways you were exactly the same: in the way he looked at you every time he saw you, like you were the first rain after a long drought—palms turned up, catching droplets, because to have some small part of you was better than having none of you at all.”

➸ clara & teddy - I really liked how they became friends during camp and their dynamic/friendship was really cute! I love how they bonded over being homeschooled, their parents, and Clara making him fall in love with history was really cute! Them being apart for almost ten years and then finally finding out what caused their fallout towards the end of the book annoyed me a little (miscommunication…) but at least
they’re together now and I’m happy for them !!

“I’ve missed this”
“I’ve missed you”

Miller’s writing skillfully weaves together nostalgia, longing, and the thrill of rediscovery. The tension between Clara and Teddy is palpable, and readers will find themselves rooting for their rekindled connection

This book is not what I was expecting in a really good way.. most of the romance books that I read are fluffy and happy and take a step away from reality. This novel was reality if I’ve ever read one. It was done in a very well articulated way that made it cohesive and still had that romance feeling to it. I was rooting for Teddy and Clara since the beginning. The world building and storytelling was really good. The characters were all relevant. Surprisingly, I really liked this and I really enjoyed all the characters. I would recommend this to my friends for sure!

As a PhD student, I love reading any book set in academia Kristyn writes an accurate depiction of academia, and I related to the struggles of Clara trying to get tenure as a woman in a male dominated department. It was a delight to read about Clara and Teddy's past relationship and they find their way back to each other.

I Wanna thank St. Martins press and NetGalley for an ARC of this book in exchange for an honest review!

Ok so this book fell flat for me.. it started off so good and then I just got bored..? The main characters had poor chemistry and the male lead was so monotone it got me so mad I wanted to shake him every time he spoke. The gap in time was what lost me a bit at times because it’s a huge gap also.. the main characters barley shared any real moments with each other that I didn’t have the desire to even want to finish this book..

I love a second chance romance and this was perfect for what I needed. I read this is one sitting. I loved the childhood sweetheart vibes and the characters. It was fun to watch them reconnect. This was the perfect easy breezy rom com with some depth.

*second chance romance
*friends to lovers
*summer camp alum
*academia
*close proximity
*dual timeline

I wanted to like this one a lot more than I managed to -
*I found the story moved very slowly - like, I kept reading other books and had to keep picking this one up because I never felt compelled by what was happening to read further
*the flashbacks grew tedious
*none of the characters seemed knowable
*no risk here at all - the stakes are yawningly low

Unfortunately, I wasn’t able to connect with this one.




Thank you to St. Martin’s Griffin and NetGalley for the DRC

Thank you NetGalley and Kristyn J. miller for an early copy! Such a sweet second chance romance! I’m a sucker for a dual timeline and Teddy is my favorite kind of book boyfriend. The quiet, reserved, sweet intellectual type. This was such an enjoyable experience to navigate a 17 year friendship to a falling out to lovers all in an academic setting. The added bonus was all the millennial nostalgia for emo kid music 🖤🖤

First and foremost, I have to say that Given Our History should be a required read for any contemporary romance fans. It was very reminiscent of Emily Henry's style. The book alternates between the present timeline and the past of Clara and Teddy's relationship. We learn about the beginnings of their friendship at summer camp and the demise of their friendship later while they reconnect in real time.
Now, I am biased because this book takes place in Maryland, Clara is from Maryland, and she went to University of Maryland (though I will say the author mistakenly put that freshmen orientation is the first week of college when it's actually during the summer, but we'll pretend it was held during that week at the time the character went to college), SO I was really excited to read. All that being said, it did not disappoint one bit. The friends to lovers slow burn was perfect. It gave People We Meet On Vacation mixed with Every Summer After (minus the messy love triangle of Every Summer After). The characters made me smile and laugh and I just really, really liked them. Clara's relationship with her younger sister, Reagan, was fun to read because they are really only getting to become friends as adults. Teddy and Clara have fun inside jokes. What a treat to get a peek into these characters' lives.