This book has been one of my most anticipated reads of 2024 right behind Casey McQuiston’s upcoming Novel “The Pairing” which comes out this August. Both authors are auto buy authors for me. None of their romance books have ever let me down with the lowest rating for both authors being a 4.5.
I have also been in a huge slump this year. I have read 25 books which is amazing but nothing has been a 5 star read which has been honestly pretty sad and hasn’t really gotten me excited to read. I made a blog post last week about my Five Star Predictions with Funny Story being number one on that list. Let me tell you this book did not disappoint!
“I was never the one just having fun. I was the one anticipating consequences.”
― Emily Henry, Funny Story
About The Book
Author: Emily Henry
Publisher: Berkley
Published Date: April 23rd, 2024
Page Count: 400 Pages
Main Genres: Romance, Contemporary
GoodReads Rating: 4.44
Synopsis
Daphne always loved the way her fiancé Peter told their story. How they met (on a blustery day), fell in love (over an errant hat), and moved back to his lakeside hometown to begin their life together. He really was good at telling it…right up until the moment he realized he was actually in love with his childhood best friend Petra.
Which is how Daphne begins her new story: Stranded in beautiful Waning Bay, Michigan, without friends or family but with a dream job as a children’s librarian (that barely pays the bills), and proposing to be roommates with the only person who could possibly understand her predicament: Petra’s ex, Miles Nowak.
Scruffy and chaotic—with a penchant for taking solace in the sounds of heart break love ballads—Miles is exactly the opposite of practical, buttoned up Daphne, whose coworkers know so little about her they have a running bet that she’s either FBI or in witness protection. The roommates mainly avoid one another, until one day, while drowning their sorrows, they form a tenuous friendship and a plan. If said plan also involves posting deliberately misleading photos of their summer adventures together, well, who could blame them?
But it’s all just for show, of course, because there’s no way Daphne would actually start her new chapter by falling in love with her ex-fiancé’s new fiancée’s ex…right?
Synopsis from GoodReads
Rating
“It’s easy to be loved by the ones who’ve never seen you fuck up. The ones you’ve never had to apologize to, and who still think all your ‘quirks’ are charming.”
― Emily Henry, Funny Story
Review
I like to go into my books basically blind. Meaning i don’t know much if anything about the synopsis of a book before I dive in. Could this be self sabotage? I suppose it leads to that sometimes, But most of the time I find that a book holds my interest more if I don’t already know the direction it will be going in. I state this because I had no clue this is a fake dating book until my boyfriend read the synopsis and just started laughing. It is a running joke in my house that I am just attracted to fake dating tropes as almost every romance book I blindly purchase ends up being fake dating.
For the first time in awhile I actually didn’t find any of the main characters annoying which was a huge shock to me! I have just been finding a lot of main characters in romance books very unlikeable and unrelatable which makes it really hard to finish the book. In fact, this book was more relatable than I thought it would be.
I really enjoyed the serious conversations directed towards dysfunctional families and the healing that comes after. A lot of the main characters faults came from their childhood traumas that they endured and that felt really refreshing. Especially because they could both relate to one another and give advice and reassurance when needed. But at the same time they both experienced different challenges growing up so they may not have always had the best advice but it was nice to know that they had someone to lean on.
This book really hit all the big relationship groups family, friends, lovers and it was written very well! Especially the friendship subplot. It really focused on how hard it can be to make friends as an adult but even just in life in general. One key take away with this is not to judge a book by its cover. She did just that with her friend in the book and it overall took them a year to connect even though they worked at the same place. It is a nice reminder that everyone is going through their own things and just starting a deeper conversation can truly open up a whole new side of a person you may have not had the chance to see until you have actually tried making that connection.
The best part about this book was the slow burn! I was so positive things would escalate quickly between the main characters but every time they got close it would immediately cool down, it kept me hooked into the story for sure!
Typically in books I don’t like the third act conflict as they feel redundant and just overall ridiculous and end up making the book lose its five star rating. With this book I had no issues with the third act conflict and I was shocked! I actually kind of agreed with the issue at hand and I think it was handled really well! In fact it is one of the reasons her friendship ends up working out in the end.
Overall I am so happy with this book! Emily Henry pulled me out of a horrible slump and I am not surprised. I highly recommend reading at least one of her books, if not this one, maybe try “Book Lovers”.
“Trust people’s actions, not their words. Don’t love anyone who isn’t ready to love you back. Let go of the people who don’t hold on to you. Don’t wait on anyone who’s in no rush to get to you.”
Emily Henry, Funny Story
QOTD: Should I rank Emily Henry’s Books? This may require a re-read but I am not opposed.
“You can’t force a person to show up, but you can learn a lesson when they don’t”
Emily Henry, Funny Story
World of Bai 