Happy Place by Emily Henry is a funny romantic comedy about finding your happy place. Happy place is the novel’s theme and how you can get there through a job, vacation, or your person. The story has sexy, comedic, and very “real” moments. The novel is told in the present day but with many flashbacks to show happier times. I thought the overall story was very well written and balanced the highs and lows of the character’s emotions. The pace was very fast and made the novel easy to consume. The novel is a very beat-by-beat romantic comedy, but there was a twist that I did not see coming that elevated the story. This is my first romantic comedy ready, I’ve read stories with both elements but this is the first novel of this genre for me and I had a good time with is all that I can ask for. I did like that in the end everything is not all happily forever just happily for right now, and there are going to be consequences of our actions that we will have to deal with later. Good novels for me make me think and this novel made me think about my happy place and how to hold on to it. Happy Place was published on April 25, 2023.

Plot Summary: Harriet a woman reeling from a breakup with her long-distance fiancé, gets the opportunity to return to her happy place a cabin in Maine with her best friends and former roommates from college. Once she gets there she finds her fiancé with the ring back on pretending like the breakup did not happen. She learns this is not her average getaway because two of her friends are getting married. Harriet met Wyn her fiancé at the happy place and the couple practically forced him to come. Harriet and Wyn have not told any of their friends about the break-up they must pretend to still be together not ruin their friend’s wedding. Everything is going fine until pretending to be lovers starts bringing back old feelings that the happy place used to.

What I Liked: The comedy for the most part was well-written and made me laugh. I liked most of the characters. Kimmy was my favorite of the characters, I love the life-of-the-party attitude. The story was well told. I loved the plot twist that was towards the end of the book that changed the motivations of the characters. I liked that the characters were swept up in love but were still looking at the reality of their situation. I loved the joke about getting condoms.

What I Disliked: I wanted more description of the quaint little town in Maine, because I found it hard to picture. Some cheesy jokes made me groan. Harriet and Wyn took me a long time to get behind as characters. They eventually grew on me, but it took me a while to be fully behind this relationship. I felt Harriet played the victim too much and Wyn wined too much.

Recommendations: I think this is a funny little romance that kept growing on me. I had fun with the characters and their competitive nature to out-romance the other. The story made me think of what my own happy place is. The story reminded me of the Matthew McConaughey and Kate Hudson movie How to Lose a Guy in 10 Dates, where they are really annoyed at each other but pretending not to be. I recommend this to my followers who need a cute little fast-paced romantic comedy.

Rating: I rated Happy Place by Emily Henry 4 out of 5 stars.