People We Meet on Vacation Book Review

"I'm on vacation. Vacations always end. It's the very that it's finite that makes travelling so special. You could move to any of those destinations you loved in small does, and it wouldn't be the spellbinding, life-altering seven days you spend there as a guest, letting a place into your heart, letting it change you."

Dare I say that this is my new favorite Emily Henry book!?! As you may or may not know, Emily Henry is one of my all time favorite authors, and People We Meet on Vacation is the only book of hers that I hadn't read so far. The first Emily Henry book I picked up was Book Lovers, and until now it has remained reigning champ of my favorite Henry book. Maybe I just need a re-read since I first read it in 2022, but I absolutely feel in love with everything about People We Meet on Vacation. Inspired by When Harry Meet Sally, this book follows Alex and Poppy throughout their 12 years of friendship and into something more. Every summer for ten years, they would go on a trip together. But on their last ill-fated summer trip, something shifts between them and they don't talk for 2 years. Desperate to repair their friendship, Poppy convinces Alex to go on one last summer trip with her, giving them one last chance to discover their true feelings for each other.

This book switches between the past and the present with every few chapters, describing each of Alex and Poppy's past summer trips alongside their present one. This was such a fun way to structure the book because you get to see Poppy and Alex's relationship grow from best friends to something more than truly platonic, in contrast to their awkwardness and even coldness towards each other during their reunion in the present. Since it goes in order from their first summer together to their last unfortunate trip that nearly ended their friendship, it keeps you guessing what happened between them while getting hints of clues from their current-day interactions mixed in between. Also, it was just super fun to read about all the different locations and Alex and Poppy's adventures. This also gave a bit of a relief from the tension too.

I think the reason I loved this book so much was just because it resonated so much with my current interests and life experiences. For one thing, this book is centered around the idea of travelling, which is something that I have in recent years grow a huge passion and desire for, so it was really fun to read about Poppy travelling on a budget in her college years and all the amazing places she visited. Also, Poppy starts out as a low-budget travel blogger, which is super cool because I am obviously trying to grow my own blog, and I haven't read a book where a character was also going through that process. Poppy then goes on to work for a big-time travel magazine, and although this book is fiction, it just kind of proved to me that you can start small and build your way up throughout life. Although I haven't lived as much life as 30-ish year old Poppy, I saw myself in her and her struggle a lot. After working for her dream company for a few years, Poppy accepts that she isn't truly happy in the life that she knows she should be grateful for. She feels stuck after reaching her life goal and unmotivated since she no longer has anything in her life to work towards. I'm am also someone who always needs to have a new goal or challenge, so reading about Poppy's experience made that feeling finally feel validated for me when so many people are always telling you to settle for one big accomplishment instead of pushing yourself to move on to other things.

One last thing I want to mention to convince you to read this book is that I am not a friends-to-lovers fan, but it was done so well in this book. I think that the fact that it is friends-to-lovers is the reason I put off reading this book for so long, although it is one of Emily Henry's earlier ones. I'm such an enemies-to-lovers girlie that the idea of lovers being friends first kind of makes me cringe, but I think in this book it just felt so real life and natural for the characters. Honestly, the whole time I was reading this book, I kind of forgot it was fiction and it literally felt like I could just be reading a story about my neighbor or something. Since I am such a big fantasy reader, reading a book that reads so much like someone's every day life experience is just so mind blowing and fascinating to me. This book had me sobbing at the end, and I don't think I've read a fiction book where I was as invested in the characters or has actually made me cry.

Anyways, Emily Henry is releasing a new book next month and the movie adaptation of People We Meet on Vacation (with Tom Blyth as Alex <3) is coming out later this year, so you should definitely read up on this book plus all of Emily Henry's other works!