I’ll admit to enjoying Cochrun‘s previous books a fair bit more especially through plot pacing and characterizations.

However I have to applaud Cochrun’s ability to write such heavy subject matter in a rather beautiful way.

Definitely pulled at my heartstrings. Shed more than a few tears reading this.

This romance was very grief centered which can admittedly be a bit triggering. I loved it though. This was so emotion and beautiful and I love alison's writing.

I always recommend Alison Cochran books because she never disappoints. She has done it once again!

This is a heartfelt & gripping story. This story features heartbreak & loss. The author deals with those topics generously. The 2 mc’s relationship is almost a subplot to the bigger overarching story here.

There’s great representation featured in this book
LGBTQ, ADHD, anxiety!

Thank you to NetGalley, the author & the publisher for a copy of the ARC!

Here We Go Again was an amazing enemies to lovers story that was filled with so much heart! I enjoyed the tension and budding romance between Logan and Rosemary, who appear to be comically opposite from one another. While the romance aspect is what initially drew me to Cochrun’s latest novel, I especially loved the plot surrounding their beloved English teacher and how both characters come together to take him on a road trip across the country. This pulled on my heartstrings and was a beautiful story! I highly recommend for anyone that enjoys Emily Henry novels or Cochrun’s prior novel, Kiss Her Once for Me.

alison cochrun you're getting my next therapy bill because I am not okay after reading this. this was the book you were meant to write.

FF
Friends to enemies to lovers
Self discovery and growth
Neurodivergent representation
Dual POV

Rating: 5/5 - this book was incredible but I will never read it again
🌶️: 2/5 - there were a couple explicit intimate scenes

TLDR: This is an incredible book. Read it with tissues nearby.

Boy oh boy will this book make you feel all your feelings. This book is just beautiful. It has so many incredible elements and poignant moments. It was funny and I laughed. It was beautifully romantic and I cried. It was so sad and I sobbed. There are so many elements to this book that I don't even know where to start so I'll just say read it. Ultimately I would recommend this book to everyone and warn them to have tissues handy.

I DNFed this book at around the 33% mark. I just wasn't vibing with the characters and their relationship. Lots of people love Alison Cochrun, so your mileage may vary.

CW: death of a loved one, grief, dying, death of a parent (past)

Thank you to NetGalley, the author, and Atria for the gifted e-book ❤️ #gifted. My review is comprised of my honest thoughts.

Read this if you like: Dual POV, second chances, childhood friends to lovers, neurodivergent representation, steamy, road trip

I wanted to love this book, but there were parts/tropes I didn't like at all. They messed up the story for me. This book made me laugh out loud multiple times. It's also very heartbreaking. 😪 In the end, I realized they just didn't have much chemistry, in my opinion. I do recommend it!

This author knows how to write romance! I feel like her books keep getting better and better! The romance starts to feel more realistic as she writes them!
I am such a sucker for childhood friends to lover, especially in queer stories because it comes back to them figuring out who they truly are! Such a good trope and she does it well!
I thought there was so much chemistry between the love interests, it allowed me as the reader to feel connected to them, and I loved it! I look forward to seeing what she writes next!

I loved this! It's a poignant story about growing up, finding yourself, admitting to mistakes, facing regrets, and going out and experiencing life in all its beauty, unpredictability, and heartbreak. There's humor, road trip adventures, a failed service dog, found family, and, of course, romance. But it's also bittersweet and deals with grief, dying, abandonment, addiction, and mental health. Getting to know these characters wasn't always comfortable but by the end I was going through it with them, celebrating and grieving. While I love both Logan and Rosemary, Joe is my favorite character, and the chapters in Louisiana were my favorite in the book. Overall, a lovely and joyous read!

I rated this 3.75 stars.

This is a big heartstrings-pulling story, and I applaud the author for also making it so funny and charmingly romantic. It took me longer than usual to get through because I read it in ebook, and audio is my preferred medium for this genre.

It's definitely a cheesy, trope-y read at times, which is both a pro and a con in my books. My biggest critique would be that the author leans a bit too heavily into queer, sapphic, and neurodivergent stereotypes. At times, this felt alienating... and, at other times, it felt clunky and awkward.

I don't know that I would describe this reading experience as "feel-good", because it deals very heavily and very intimately with dying and grieving a loved one. It is, however, an emotional read that includes a romantic resolution.

Alison Cochrun really said: Let‘s make my readers feel love, despair and happiness all at the same time!

And let me tell you. I was here for it. Here we go again is a lesbian enemies to lovers romance - yes - but it‘s so so so much more. It‘s love that transcends romantic love. It‘s unconditional and soul deep. It‘s cross-country roadtrips and venturing outside your comfort zone. It‘s seeing neurodiversity as an asset instead of a hindrance. It‘s healing and hurting and being hopeful.

In short, this is an absolutely beautiful book.
Please note that you should be in the right mindset to read it! The topic of grief felt too overwhelming and too much for me when this lovely book was first released. I only picked it back up when I felt more secure about it! 🫶🏻 Please take care of yourselves.

Otherwise, go read it! I promise you that there will be tears and goosebumps and hiccup-giggles en masse ❤️

I loved this book and connected it from page one. As a huge fan of Alison Cochrun's previous release, "The Charm Offensive," this book was filled with all the little neurodivergent idiosyncrasies that made me fall in love with Dev and Charlie and relate to them both so much. In "Here We Go Again," Logan and Rosemary just bounce off the page and both feel like totally believable, real people with imperfections and arcs that carry them through the book. I loved Joe as the teacher/father figure character and fodder for their relationship. Can't recommend this book highly enough. A personal copy of it is going on my shelf.

Alison Cochrun is one of my ride-or-die authors for sure. 3 out of 3 books are FIVE PHENOMENAL STARS!!!! I simply cannot get over the way she weaves an incredible story line with the most stunning of queer discussions all the while bringing out ALL THE TEARS. Alison Cochrun made me fall in love with romance. I loved this book just as much as I loved her other works as well. Absolutely brilliant.

Full disclosure up front with this book. The last 50 pages or so made me sob so hard that I went through about twenty tissues and left puddles of tears soaked into my couch where I was reading. I was a full mess. I loved it.

An ailing high school teacher asks two of his former students to help him with his dying wish: drive him across the country so he can finish out his days in a house by the water. The only problem with these two students is that they used to be best friends who now hate each other. But of course, once they begin spending more time together, all those old high school feelings come back in full force.

The romance of this book is lovely and there’s romance woven through every page, whether it be between the main characters Logan and Rosemary or the others in the book. In fact, the plot line that affected me the most was completely separate from Logan and Rosemary. That’s how good Alison Cochrun is. You come for the main characters’ love story and end up being invested in two others to the point where your eyes become swollen from how many tears are spilled.

But I digress.

This book is so special and is more than just a romance book. It’s an exploration of queer joy, queer regret, and queer living. It sang to me and someday I’ll be emotionally ready to read it again.

So, while the cover of this book gives accurate vibes in terms of the fact that this is a road trip book, please read the synopsis of the book before picking it up because what the cover doesn't show is the dying English teacher (and his dog) who is also in that van.

Okay, let me start from the beginning. Essentially, this book follows Logan and Rosemary who are two women who used to be best friends and then they had a big falling out. Now they are adults and teach at the same high school. They are both close to their high school English teacher. Logan is a self-professed mess, a Lesbian, and also a "fuckboy," while Rosemary is straight-passing Lesbian (also, I really think she's on the ace spectrum but I can't remember if that's addressed), Type A, and a bit neurotic. The two of them wind up agreeing to take their high school English teacher on a road trip to this home he owns in Maine because he's dying and instead of dying in the hospital or with hospice, he wants to die in his home in Maine.

The road trip that was planned is not really how things wind up going (obviously) and instead you wind up on quite the journey. This is a book that I think will hit for a lot of people. It did not hit for me. The emotional beats in this book wound up hitting too late for me to get invested. I love a messy main character, but not, honestly, more than I love a Type A character whose life is spiraling in a way they are not okay with. So Rosemary was my GIRL in this book. But somehow the pacing of the emotional beats just really left me feeling like this book was lacking overall. I've now read all three of Cochran's books though and none of them have hit perfectly for me yet, so maybe she's just not the author for me. That said, I know she is the author for so many people, so if you're in the space to read a grief book, take care of yourself, but I would not steer you away from it!

THIS BOOK WAS *ACTUAL* PERFECTION!!!
It was beyond hilarious but also SO heartwarming.
it was story of love and loss - heartbreak and grief
it's a read the make you swoon but also bawl your eyes out simultaneously!
this was exceptionally written - it was a story that will forever stick with me
anyone who has experienced the loss of a loved one, will wholeheartedly connect to this beautiful story.
Logan & Rosemary were TRULY made for each other. Their banter was EVERYTHING and there connection was FIREEE!!
BUT the true star of the show?! JOE!!
He was the embodiment of living life to the fullest each and every day - and we should ALLL live like Joe.
love is worth taking risks for. love is worth the heartbreak, and pain..because it turns into a stunning love story.
Seriously ya'll: if you have not read this book yet... RUNNNN to find it at local library, bookstore, ANYWHERE!!

A sapphic Mamma Mia inspired second chance romance roadtrip novel?? Sign me up!

I have loved Alison Cochrun's other novels but this one might be my favorite. I am already a book crier but the tears that this book made me cry? Uncountable.

The way the author intertwined Rosemary's and Logan's story with their friendship with Joe was so heartbreakingly beautiful. I have had many English teachers who changed my life and this was a beautiful tribute to all of those teachers who made a difference, especially those who created a safe space for their students.

I will say, however, that the main romance felt overshadowed by Joe's story. I don't think it's necessarily a bad thing since I enjoyed Joe's story more than the main plot, but it made it less of a romance novel.

The ended truly gutted me in the best way. Alison Cochrun is a true artist for being able to combine so many emotions in the final scenes of this book.

4.5 Stars

This book! I wasn’t expecting this one to be jammed packed with emotion.

It’s a road trip book but so much more! Filled with a cast of lovable characters and adventure. This book will make you smile, laugh and cry. I suggest looking at the trigger warnings because it is a book about an end-of-life adventure. It’s also a second chance queer romance about opening up your heart and dealing with curve-balls that life throws at you. It was beautiful book!

A strong 4 stars for this sapphic, friends-to enemies-to lovers romance. The main characters, Logan and Rosemary, grant the literal dying wish of their former high school teacher (who has become a close friend and mentor to both of them) by taking him on a cross-country road trip in the "gayest van on the west side of the Mississippi." Logan and Rosemary couldn't be more different, and the forced proximity forces all three of them to explore their complicated relationships, the choices they have each made in the past, and their future. The novel touches on so many issues and themes - friendships, death, neurodiversity, mental health, forgiveness, and of course love - and somehow manages to be funny, sad, AND spicy. I love Alison Cochrun's writing. Her character development is flawless, I loved these characters and was immediately invested in the story. I cried, I laughed, and I cried some more.

Thank you to Atria Books and NetGalley for this ARC in exchange for an honest review.

#netgalley #atriabooks #herewegoagain