<b>— 6 stars ✰</b>

<blockquote><i>“In every universe, it’s you for me. Even if it’s not me for you.”</i></blockquote>
and that’s just one of many underlines that are filling my copy of this book.

listen, i don’t give books the 6 star label. ever. i hardly give books 5 star ratings. but this one? even a 6 star seems too low. any star rating seems so mediocre for what this book was.

i’m famously a sucker for emily henry. her writing, her characters, her plots, they’re all just so ... <b>perfect</b>. her books are just a form of drug to me.

‘happy place’ was no different. first of all, even just the premise of the book had me hooked (it <i>was</i> my most anticipated release of 2023 for a reason). six friends on their last ever trip to a cottage they call home? with fake dating? i knew i would love this before i even owned it.

and don’t even get me started on the characters. i could literally talk about them for days. i loved the diversity, not just in race or class, but in every single aspect. each of them had something to bring to the table and it was really refreshing to see that. so many books now feel like they hardly have side characters worth caring about, let alone ones that readers can relate to.

and harriet? oh my god i am her she is me. i’ve never seen myself more in a character than in harriet. her personality, her fears, all of it was something that <i>i am too</i>. i don’t have to tell you guys how amazing that feels. you know.

harriet and wyn’s story absolutely positively: broke my heart. into pieces. tiny little pieces. i think it’s because it was realistic. the things they went through, the miscommunication that tore them apart, they were all things that i’ve seen or heard in real life. it could also be that “right person wrong time” always gets to me. take your pick.

aside from the characters and their dynamics, the themes in this hit <i>way</i> too close to home. fear of failure. people changing and growing apart. not knowing what the hell you want to do with your life. and the fear of that. i feel like everyone feels these things at some point or another, but these are things that haunt me. life is terrifying, but at the same time it isn’t. life is just one big contradiction. and we see that in this book. it made me sob, but it was also .. relieving? harriet’s story in particular.

this might be my new favorite book of all time. and that’s not even an exaggeration. i genuinely have never felt this way about anything i’ve ever read. i’ve never felt so connected to a story or its characters, never felt so many emotions while reading words on paper (i mean, i literally had to remind myself that it’s just <i>words on paper</i> and not a real story). and i already want to reread it. i want to annotate it more. i fell asleep thinking about this book and woke up wishing i could forget it all so i could read it for the first time again.

thank you emily henry for another gut wrenching book that doubles as a comfort read. you are a genius. i adore you for this.

and if you’re one of the ones that gave this less than five stars, you’re wrong. anyone who gave this book a bad review, you’re lying. (i’m kidding <s>not really</s>, i respect your opinions, but truly how could you not love this).

ps ‘come back...be here’ is harriet and wyn’s song. i fell asleep crying to it last night. i will hear no arguments.