DNF'd at 35%

I usually love Rainbow Rowell's works, but this one is falling flat for me. The premise is really interesting, but God can I NOT stand Shiloh. I won't spoil anything, but her character is very unlikable to me and I hate that she treats Cary.

I can see it turning into a great second-chance love story, but all of the build up has only put me against our main character and I do not really want to spend the time to see if she is redeemable.

I would perhaps pick this up as an audiobook once the wait on Libby is down, but I have been putting this off reading this for a month and I rather dnf it than feel like I should be forced to finish it.

I see other people really like this book so maybe you will as well! It just was not for me!

Thank you NetGalley and the Publisher for this ARC!

This was one of my most anticipated releases of 2024, and it was everything I hoped it’d be and more. Ever since finishing it I’ve wished I could crawl back in its pages and spend just a little more time with Shiloh and Cary. Rowell’s portrayal of the teenage years, in all their awkwardness, is authentic and refreshing. What I loved most were the characters (Shiloh’s kids, Junie especially, are some of the best I’ve read) – from Shiloh and Cary, to each of their complicated families, and everyone in between – were so carefully crafted. The dialogue is sharp, the humor is spot-on, and the emotional moments are poignant without ever veering into melodrama. In Slow Dance, Rainbow Rowell has crafted a story that resonates with anyone who has ever experienced the bittersweet journey of growing up and finding love. It’s a celebration of the small, yet significant moments that shape us and a testament to Rowell’s enduring ability to touch readers' hearts. For fans of Eleanor & Park and The Storied Life of A.J. Fikry.

I love this authors work for years and this book is no exception. The characters is the dialogue the plot the story. Everything is quite delectable! Really can’t wait for her next book.

Rainbow Rowell is SO GOOD at writing dialogue. The conversations between the characters in this book make up the vast majority of the words in the novel, and her dialogue writing is truly some of the best I've ever read. So realistic, so believable, to the point that it feels like you are a fly on the wall in these characters' lives. The excellent writing almost made up for the fact that I found these characters, especially Shiloh, absolutely insufferable. I actively hated both of them and could not stand how they were incapable of having an actual conversation about anything substantial at all. They talked around their feelings and thoughts, hopes and dreams, for almost the entirety of the book. This is forgivable and completely understandable in the childhood/teenager portions of the book, but as thirty-somethings? No. Come on. I enjoyed reading this book, but it could have been so much better if the characters were even a little bit likeable.

It took me a while to get into because the beginning is pretty melancholy and I didn’t really want to read something that would make me sad, but I thought the story really picked up at like 20%.

Shiloh in the flashbacks was pretty obnoxious, but in a way that feels deeply relatable, because she becomes much more thoughtful as an adult. This book was romantic in a very pragmatic and realistic way - two people putting in the work to understand and forgive each other.

Friends since high school, Cary and Shiloh haven’t seen one another in years, until they meet up again at their best friend Mike’s wedding. Shiloh is now divorced and Cary is never in one place since joining the Navy. But there is still something simmering between them, there always has been.

This book is essentially Normal People with slightly less toxicity. And if you’ve heard my feelings about Normal People, you know that isn’t a compliment. I wanted to like this one, I had heard great things about it, but I think I’m in the minority in saying I just really didn’t enjoy it like I wanted to.

I found Shiloh to be incredibly frustrating and I wanted Cary to run far, far away from her. Even when he was explicitly telling her what he wanted, she found a way to spin it around that he didn’t know his own mind. And so by the end I wasn’t at all rooting for them. And the drag out of their relationship felt needlessly long. I wanted to finish it to see how she would sum up their time together but I think I likely could’ve skipped about 50 pages and just read the end.

I know a lot of people are going to love this book and I wish I had been one of them but sadly, it just wasn’t for me.

I'm an absolute sucker for second chance romance, and this one quenched that thirst. The characters really shown in this one with how real, vulnerable, and raw they were throughout.

Cute romance and a quick read.
Two teen-age friends reunite and try to figure out if there is something more. Flashbacks to teen/college years and previous relationships help give context to the relationship and provide character development.
I grew attached to Shiloh and Cary. Their friendship suffers its ups and downs but it comes down to being there for each other. Plus, I’m a sucker for a happily ever after ending, it’s takes a while but they get there..

I enjoyed this more than I thought I was going to! It had It Ends with Us feels to it. I love friends to lovers tropes and really felt for these characters immediately. I can totally see this turning into a movie or a show. This was my first Rainbow Rowell book but definitely wont be my last.

Thank you to NetGalley and William Morrow for the chance to read an early edition of the novel, "Slow Dance," by Rainbow Rowell. I could not put it down. In fact, I read it in one sitting. It transported me back to highschool and what falling in love with your best friend was like as a teenager.

Shiloh, Cary, and Mikey were the best of friends in high school and they spent all of their time together. They were all incredibly close to one another, but everyone could see that Cary and Shiloh were madly in love with one another. The only problem was neither of them could admit it to themselves.

When highschool ended they all went their separate ways. Cary joined the Navy, Shiloh went to college, and Mikey became an artist. Later they would all come together when Mikey got married and both Shiloh and Cary attended his wedding. They soon had to face the strong feelings they obviously still had for one another.

This novel was a compelling story of first love and how sometimes it also turns out to be a young couple's last love. Cary and Shiloh soon discover they had always been more than just friends, but it also took a lot of time for both of them to realize they were meant to be together forever. By the time they find their way back to one another, both of them have had other love interests, including a marriage, children, and divorce. After quite a bit of time had passed, they then had to sort out whether or not they could make a relationship work between them.

I truly loved this story and would highly recommend it to anyone who loves young adult books, especially a great wholesome love story. I personally thought it was a five star read.

Thank you NetGalley and William Morrow for this ARC!

Let me start off by saying, I’m a huge fan of Rainbow's book FanGirl and I had been wanting to read more by her. I loved this cover and honestly, I requested this book without reading the synopsis. I think if I would have, I probably wouldn’t have requested.

The writing is wonderful and I enjoyed the characters and the realness of Slow Dance. I myself don’t have children and don’t plan on having kids, so the single mom trope didn’t really work for me. I did love Junie and Gus though! Not my favorite romance book, but I feel I will be in the minority with this.

All that being said, if you enjoy the childhood friends to lovers trope you will love Slow Dance!

As it turns out, I’m far more uncomfortable with intimacy than I realized. This is by far the most beautifully written romantic relationship I’ve ever read and I was uncomfortable for all of it. If you’re looking for realistic, relatable romance with the tiniest hint of spice, this is the one for you. If you are emotionally stunted and possibly afraid of intimacy, steer clear 😅

This was a great 'second-chance at love' story. I really enjoyed getting to know Shiloh & Cary through the flashbacks, and seeing how they still fit together, despite their very different life experiences after high school. The characters were interesting, the story intriguing, and the world-building was top notch. Definitely recommended!

Shiloh and Cary are the perfect story of young love that isn't ready to be yet. They show how people can make mistakes, sometimes a lot, and still return to that foundation of friendship and love in the future. Some of the back and forth timelines could have been a bit clearer for me in terms of when in their lives the flashbacks were happening, but that didn't take away from the story.

4.5 stars and my infinite thanks to Netgalley and the Publisher for the eARC, even if this review is a little late.

Y'all. Rainbow Rowell can fucking write a love story. Can write people with personalities that clash so much they almost don't make sense and make them fall in love and it fuckin works.

Slow Dance follows Shiloh and Cary as they navigate their best friendship, and more, in high school and beyond. Their high school years were so vivid and believable, it almost hurt to read. They were aching to just be next to each other, let alone Cary being in love with her the whole time.

I loved that it the Before didn't follow a linear timeline. It jumped around and changed POV between Shiloh and Cary, and I got lost a time or two, but it was easy to catch up.

The only issue I had with Slow Dance was how long it took for Angel and Cary to reconnect. I wish we could have gotten that sooner and fleshed it out. a little bit more.

I tend to struggle a lot with books about your Average Person managing their Average Life, so I was surprised by how invested I felt in this story and its characters.

Rainbow Rowell herself is clearly not an average person, evident in her talent and success as a writer, and perhaps it’s a credit to this that she’s able to get us to invest in the regular guys and gals love story trope.

As the story progresses and we get to know characters, it becomes evident that the central characters are people who likely have more to offer than the constraints of their lives allow, which is part of it too, and perhaps this idea of a person trapped by their circumstances rather than their limitations or lack of ambition is where the appeal comes in.

I actually liked Shiloh a lot, even if the weirdness about dancing felt silly and as though it existed more to feed the title and give her an obvious hang up than it did a legitimate issue, more of an idiosyncrasy than evidence of a deeper issue. That said, I love that there’s no true tragedy to this story, and Rowell is so good about making you feel for every little thing in a character’s world without ever needing to resort to the all-too-common tragedy porn and emotional manipulation common to the plotting of far too much of Women’s Fiction.

Slow Dance is an adult romance by Rainbow Rowell. I recommend the book for those who like second chance romances, flawed characters, and/or Rainbow Rowell books. This is a current Reese's Book Club pick.

Thanks to NetGalley and William Morrow for the advanced digital copy of the book.

I’ve loved all of Rowell’s books in the past, so I was thrilled to get a copy of her newest release and it didn’t disappoint!

Slow Dance is a romance, but rather than a fast-paced rom com, it’s more of a slow burn love story. Our main characters — Shiloh and Cary — are both nuanced and flawed, but likable, and I couldn’t help rooting for both of them. Through the story, we see them grow up, grow apart and then we get to watch their relationship rekindle when they reconnect as adults. I just love Rowell’s writing so much! I love the way she develops character and I felt so invested in these characters’ lives!

If you like a slow burn, character-driven love story, definitely pick this one up! You won’t be disappointed!

Rainbow Rowell never disappoints. The story, the characters were all relatable. I simply need more of Cary and Shiloh. I want to know what happens lol.

I am grateful to Net Galley for the opportunity to read and review this book. I wanted to love it, but it fell a little flat for me. I wasn’t really invested in the characters and thought the story dragged a bit. I am glad to have read it and overall consider this a 3 star read. I wasn’t in a hurry to pick it up between reading opportunities but it was fine.