There’s an ambition and a boldness to it that belies the smalltown setting and the quiet connections it celebrates, and above all such a non-obnoxious sense of hope. There's so much tension, and so much work done in trusting each other and confronting each other's demons and learning to move forward. While it may have started slow, it picked up in a big way and left me with huge hearts (and a few tears) in my eyes. So while this was a relaxing way to spend an afternoon reading, I was really hoping for more gravitas to the story.

Georgie, used to putting others' needs first after working as a demanding assistant, now feels a sense of emptiness. will be skipping this book, because although i love isiah as an uncle, i do not like him as a main character. Plus all the things I loved most about it were skimmed over more than I'd like, mostly Levi and his siblings and Georgie actually figuring out what she wants. Family emergencies, unexpected life-shifting events, and the busy rhythms of family life have at times left her reeling.But then Georgie comes across a forgotten artifact—a “friendfic” diary she wrote as a teenager, filled with possibilities she once imagined. After addressing mental and physical hygiene, Gallo shares her approaches to working with the different archetypes. And the truth - which I think this book understands - is that on a macro level, we can't ever really do that: go back and do life differently.

So even if, like me, you would sooner throw yourself off a pier than be anything like you were in high school. It made me cringe, to be honest, because it came across as forced to me and there was little to no chemistry there. And who better to help her than the grumpy older brother of the very same high school crush whose name is all over this friend fic in puffy sparkle pen? Georgie is impulsive, flighty, flexible, funny, a great organizer of others’ time and things, and she’s confused about her future.

From the small-town setting, to the forced-proximity, to the expertly utilised sunshine/grumpy dynamic, I was all on board, finding it extremely hard to put the book down to attend to real life for the duration of this read.