This book was surprisingly heart-wrenching, beautifully written story about two people who come together and go through grief and navigate life.

This isn’t typically a book I would pick up and read but I enjoyed nonetheless!

What an amazing debut novel!
I love books about books, and this one was no exception. You can feel how passionate the characters are about written words on paper. I love how the author portrayed some themes like mental health and grief, in a way that didn't take away from the main story. Erin was a complicated character for me, I didn't entirely like her, but I did like the romance. The ending felt a bit rushed, and it left me wanting to read more.

Overall rating 3.5/5
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Pub Date Sep 03 2024

Thank you to NetGalley, Harlequin Trade Publishing, Graydon House and the author for giving me the chance to read an eARC of this book in exchange for my honest opinion.

I received this book as an ARC from NetGalley and I absolutely loved it! This is a debut novel, and an impressive one at that. The idea of a couple falling in love through the words written in the margins of books was so sweet. Although this novel is a romance, I feel like it deals with so much more. Themes such as loss, grief, mental health, abandonment and forgiveness are shown throughout the entirety of the book. The only thing I wish this book had was an epilogue. I wish we could have seen more of the “happy ever after.” I while highly recommend this book!

Thank you to NetGalley and Harlequin books for an advanced copy for an honest review.

This was a great debut by Tessa Bickers which explores trauma, love, friendship, and growth. The story is told from two viewpoints. Erin is struggling to find her way after the loss of her best friend to cancer. James is also struggling as he cares for his ill mother and tries to figure out his life.

I loved the way the book swap brought them together. This was a cute way to connect them, but I would have liked to see it explored even further.

I read the book quickly and was eager to see what the characters learned and how they grew.

I look forward to reading more by this author. I know that over time her work will be even better.

This book was so beautiful. It tackles love, loss, mental health, and trying to navigate life as an adult. I think it encompasses what a lot of people my age feel like and maybe that’s why the book resonated with me so much. Erin, James, and Bonnie were a trio of friends in school. Bonnie and Erin stop being friends with James over a betrayal. The story picks back up once they’re graduated and well into adulthood. Erin starts a correspondence with someone via a little library writing back and fourth in the margins. Little does she know it’s her archenemies who she’s falling in love with. I loved their story and it would make a great movie.


TW: It does talk about cancer, death, and a lot of mental health issues which can be triggering.

📚 The Book Swap was so refreshing and heartfelt! Erin accidentally puts her favorite book in her local little library after a cleaning spree. In a panic she returns to the little library to find the book is now filled with responses to her annotations. A book swap begins between two literary lovers. The two find the joy in reading and writing again after their lives have taken unexpected turns. What Erin doesn’t know is that the mystery man she is writing, is the one guy she swore she’d never speak to again. This deep story is filled with life lessons and really makes you contemplate your own life journey and destination 📝

There are definitely some tough topics discussed, so I recommend checking trigger warnings.

“It turns out it’s possible. So very possible to feel grief, and love, all at once”

Thank you to the publisher for providing this ARC via NetGalley in exchange for an honest review. The Book Swap will be published September 3rd.

DNFed at 50%. The only reason I even made it to 50% was because I refused to give up until the characters actually started interacting. They said 1 sentence to each other before that 50%. 1 sentence guys. That’s it. That’s all you get. This is being marketed wrong. It’s not a romance. And it definitely isn’t a comedy. It’s a book about grief, suicide, cancer, death, and a lot of others that really important subjects. But I picked this up because it’s being marketed as a rom com. So I’m done.

The Book Swap was an emotional read that certainly kept me reading. The characters were well developed, and the messages were impactful. That being said, this book was advertised as a romance, and I found the romantic element to be lacking. I did not feel there was enough emotional development between James and Erin to make sense. More than anything, it seemed this book was a commentary on grief, change, and acceptance. I found Erin to be unlikeable, and her redemption was limited considering her behavior throughout the book. I just felt there was something lacking in the story, a missing layer of emotional depth that was needed to really drive the plot home. While the book did keep me engaged, it did not effectively make the point it was leading up to. This story did not surpass three stars for me, as the ending was lackluster. Overall, enjoyable read.

What a beautiful story!!
This was my first book by Tessa Bickers and will not be my last. Such a well-written story about grief, overcoming the past, boundaries, and the often harsh reality is that you can love your family but still have major issues. Absolutely love how the relationship between Erin and James was set up to already have history and then they had the exchanging of the "book club" to give their new relationship life. I think I would have enjoyed it more if it wasn't marketed as seeming like a romance novel. This was read more as a contemporary fiction with the characters each working on themselves and their situations individually with hints of romance. Still a great book and I do like the cover, but the marketing aspect could use a bit of tweaking. But overall LOVED it!!

This book was a big love/hate roller coaster for me. It was really slow to start off with and the beginning was a bit underwhelming. I felt like it dangled the past too much and im left guessing what the heck happened in the past?! I also felt like it alluded to James and Bonnie having a romantic thing and it made me hate James a tad (loved him at the end!) but when it picked up, it picked up!

Overall i felt like there as A LOT happening in such a short book that some of it seemed distracting to me as a reader. We have a conflict with each main characters job, each character struggling with grief, each character with the WRONG person, FMC with maternal issues. It just kept me on edge for so much of the book that i kept waiting for a million shoes to drop.

But I really did enjoy Erin and James journey to come back together


Thank you Netgalley and Harlequin Trade Publishing for the ARC!

My heart is full after reading this book and I really wish it was being published sooner so I could share this with everyone I know. What a great read and I cannot wait to see it flying off the shelves when it's published in September!

This one had me by the heart strings! This book covers such deep topics as- mental health, death and grief, parenting, finding yourself and of course, love. The exchanged notes between Erin and James were so sweet and I was so glad their story had a happier ending than James’ novel!

Thank you Netgalley and Harlequin Trade Publishing for the ARC!

Thank you to Net Galley for this ARC!
Even though I felt underwhelmed at some points, I really enjoyed this story. I love the idea of anonymously exchanging books marked with thoughts, feelings, hopes, dreams, etc. I also like how Bickers approaches the second chance/friends to lovers tropes. However, the lead up to the grand reveal of why Erin and James had their falling out left me disappointed. The issue just didn’t feel as pressing to me as the reader as it might have been for Erin’s character. But I do like how James stood up for himself in the end and made her listen in a sense. Also, James’ fatherhood and failure fears being grand-revealed towards the end felt like they could’ve been explored more throughout. Overall, I really liked the writing style but there were a few parts that fell flat for me.

4.5

This was so cute!! The premise is so fun: Erin and James, who have an interesting history, start to write to each other through the margins of classic books left for each other in a Little Library. They get to know each other through their annotations and questions in the books, and start to develop a relationship through the pages...except they had a big falling out in high school and Erin is not over it...

Very much You've Got Mail vibes and I was here for it. I liked seeing little references to classic books I've read or want to read and it's fun to see their little annotations. The book got a little deeper than typical rom-coms do as it delved into some of Erin and James' best friend's death and how both of them coped with it. Loved the inclusion of therapy and bipolar disorder.

Overall a wonderful debut from Tessa Bickers and I am so incredibly excited to see what else she writes!!

Thank you to NetGalley and Harlequin Trade Publishing for this ARC!

The Book Swap by Tessa Bickers is a contemporary romance and also a debut novel. It’s a second chance romance story about Erin and James, friends-turned-enemies after a big fallout and the death of their mutual friend Bonnie. Erin’s life is in shambles and without thinking she accidentally puts her favorite book (which included a keepsake from Bonnie) in her local little free library. James gets the book, not knowing whose it was, sees all of the annotations and starts a back-and-forth exchange between the two of them.

Overall I thought this was a good book. It didn’t have as much romance as I would have liked but the storyline was satisfying with how it resolved. Some heavy topics are covered in this story, including death, grief, mental health, and bullying, but there is a HEA.

I was looking for a lighter read after a few heavy books lately and thought I would find that in this book based on the synopsis. It was not light at all but far heavier than I expected. It was a good story with sweet interactions between the pages, but it just wasn't what I was expecting. Thank you netgalley for this arc in exchange for my honest opinion.

Thank you to NetGalley, Harlequin Trade Publishing|Graydon House, and Tessa Bickers, for an advance reader copy of her debut novel “The Book Swap”.

This is a love story, on many levels, of abandonment, decisions made out of fear, longing, and of learning from our mistakes. It’s about life.

There are a few things I feel are important to know about this book.
1. Tessa Bickers can write about grief very well. I felt the pain and longing, the desperation, the denial, the mood swings, I can relate. Anyone who has loved and lost someone close, especially a friend (whether that be non-familial or otherwise) knows of this type of loss. It was palpable.

2. I adored the margin comments, the back and forth between Erin and James, the love of literature. It reminded me of times I have done this and the wonderful conversations with professors about the author, the background of the culture, the layers to a story, the commentary. I felt myself thinking I should enroll in college to study literature again..

3. The author knows how to write about mental illness, at least the really hard parts of living with and loving someone with bipolar disorder, especially when they stop taking their medication. She also did a good job of showing the effects of it on those around them.

This is a very good debut novel and I look forward to reading her future stories.

I struggled with a few things, too.
1. The cover and the synopsis really threw me. I anticipated more lighthearted rom-com but it was a very deep novel. I feel that covers of books these days are made by people not even trying to do something new. So many look the same (not the author’s fault) and so we project some assumptions onto the book.
2. There was very little overt romance and that’s ok. I wasn’t apparent in the editor’s synopsis though. There was definitely longing-much longing and anger. But it wasn’t until the last quarter of the book I felt a connection.

Overall, I enjoyed this book. It was a bit slow in the beginning but once it got going, I was engaged thoroughly.

I went into this book thinking it was going to be a rom com. This book is much different than what I was expecting. The main character deals with grief, mental health issues, and family drama. Overall this was a good book. Thank you Net Galley and Harlequin Trade Publishing for the ARC copy.

Dueling point-of-view story from Erin and James as they navigate life after the loss of high school friend Bonnie and their own friendship.

Both Erin and James' present and future is bleak. Life isn't going anywhere near as planned, until James stumbles across a heavily annotated book that never should have been in the 'little library' in the first place.

Little does James know, Erin is the annotated author. An idea sparks... should they book swap? Both don't know the other is who they are talking to. What will happen when they find out? Can hearts heal after so much time?

What is the most exciting part of this book is I love this idea! I initially had the idea from the book S. By: JJ Abrams (you should read it/get your hands on it if you can). I did a few 'buddy reads' where we passed/mailed the book back and forth leaving our thoughts in the margin as we went. It was really fun!

Anyways, back to the review of The Book Swap ... overall, cute idea. Execution ... eh. The first 10% was rough. I wanted to DNF, but I hate doing that to ARCs, so I kept with it.

The rest of the book wasn't bad, persay. But it was so slow. Painfully slow. The only category I'd place this book in is, "Snail Romance".

On top of the pace, Erin is so unlikable, so selfish, daft .. it's hard to root for her. On the other hand, James is so likable you just really wish he would move on with his life. I'm a big believer in, you don't have to like the characters to like the book. In romance genre though, maybe you do. The reader has to be wanting this to work out because they are so invested in the characters.

If you take out all the romance and overarching plot line ... this book has a lot of fun nuggets that saved it for me. Actual quote from actual good books, books that all readers would love. The book swap idea, again, so cute and could inspire any reader to get together with a friend and do the same. For me, I was reading for these type of nuggets and the nuggets didn't disappoint.

For me, this was an overall boring, anti romance. I would not recommend to my friends, but I would tell them about the 'nuggets' I found while reading this book. If I had a physical copy I would love to annotate the heck out of it.

Amazon Link - The Book Swap By: Tessa Bickers

***Thank you to Harlequin Trade Publishing, NetGalley and of course, Tessa Bickers, for a  copy of the ARC in exchange for an honest review. Publishing on Sept 03, 2024.

 A book-lovers dream! References to the following classics can be found in The Book Swap.   

TO KILL A MOCKINGBIRD

GREAT EXPECTATIONS

WUTHERING HEIGHTS

MANSFIELD PARK

THE GREAT GATSBY

MIDDLEMARCH

BELOVED

ON THE ROAD

THE BELL JAR

UGH! my heart!! this friends to enemies to lovers book was the cutest and such a heartwarming book. Erin and James helping one another find themselves and find their passions was beautiful. But, Erin’s stubbornness through the whole book made me so mad!! Like, just love him!!!! However, I saw a lot of myself in her so maybe that’s why. James self discovery was really well done and I’m so so happy he got the ending he deserved in every way. I’m so happy to have read this book and I can’t wait to pick up a physical copy for myself!