Rachel Cohn

While browsing through the Strand, Dash finds a red Moleskine notebook tucked in between some of the books by his favourite author. Inside he finds a note from Lily and a dare, which he decides to follow up with a dare of his own. Thus begins a series of challenges between Dash and Lily that will take them across New York City and communicating with each other through the red notebook. But when Dash and Lily finally meet the question is raised of whether reality can ever mesh with the person show more they've imagined on the page.

A thorough charmer, like other Cohn and Levithan novels, the book is written with chapters that alternate in perspective. Dash and Lily are both fun characters with quirks and flaws, but ones to whom I found it easy to relate (I was Lily in a lot of ways in high school). The plot itself is quite fun as the characters do ridiculous (and often out of character) things at the prompting of the stranger on the other side of the notebook while also reflecting deeply on what makes us people and how we see others matching the reality of those people. The novel would make a great Christmas read, although in no way does it lose anything being read during the summer. show less

Rating: 4* of five

The Publisher Says: From New York Times bestselling authors Rachel Cohn and Melissa de la Cruz comes a freewheeling journey through Vienna where two estranged friends search for their mutual ex—and a long-lost bond.

Audrey and Ian were best friends—until they fell in love with the same man. To be precise, they fell in love with, married, and divorced the same man. And there’s no coming back from that.

Twenty-odd years later, they’re right back at the beginning: show more Vienna, where their university study abroad turned into a love triangle from which they never quite recovered. But it’s Christmas, and Audrey’s daughter is getting married. Time to let bygones be bygones.

Not for the sake of the holiday or even because they’ve matured with age…but because their mutual ex is nowhere to be found. It’s up to Audrey and Ian to track him down.

As wedding plans go further awry, the former besties race to find the father of the bride. Juggling complicated family dynamics (and the cocktails required to cope), they learn that, sometimes, it’s not about the search but the friendships rediscovered along the way.

I RECEIVED A DRC FROM THE PUBLISHER VIA NETGALLEY. THANK YOU.

My Review: A Yuletide wedding has only one thing going for it that I can see: no way to forget the date. Making the wedding itself a destination wedding? In Europe, where you need a passport and a pile of cash to travel? Well, we know already who these folks are hangin' with. Not the likes of my broke-ass self.

But let's go with the fantasy. I love a holiday romantic story. The set-up for this one's irresistible...Ian and Audrey having to solve the problem of their mutual ex-husband, the deeply self-centered borderline narcissist Beau—aptly named thing of beauty and a boy forever—ghosts Izzy (Isadora, as in Duncan) their daughter/stepdaughter on her Christmas wedding day. This is far from the first time he's behaved this thoughtlessly to either of them but they're willing to rally together to keep him from ruining their dear Izzy's slapped-together last-minute dream.

It's a romance, there is no mystery about the Happily Ever After. It's all the banter and shenanigans that make it fun to read.As Audrey and Ian mobilize to get Beau's butt where he said it would be for once, they rekindle their own badly damaged trust in each other. It's that relationship that each of them really missed, really values.

Told in alternating first-person chapters as the hunt for Beau takes the two recovering co-dependent besties from pillar to post and back again, the story sees them heal their fractured lives, their fractured friendship, and their mutual step/daughter's wildly impulsive disaster in the making. Izzy's choice of husband, her younger daughter Max's choice of a life, her testy, curmudgeonly ex-mother-in-law's rudderless aimless bad mood...Audrey's love life and Ian's love life, Beau's jerk personality all fixed as well.

It's a romance, the spoiler would be telling you *how* not *that* it all works out! I was pleased to be along for this goofy ride because, as each corner was turned, I thought "oh sure, that makes sense" exactly never. Instead I was treated to improbable, amusing solutions to the entire crew's problems. Hey, this is a wedding for two young Americans in Vienna, Austria, at the city's busiest time and there's no scheduling conflicts. This is not reality.

But it sure was fun. show less

This is NOT N&N. I spent the first 40 pages or so dealing with that. Once I got over it, though, this was wonderful. The characters are less likeable in some ways, but no less realistic, and in the end, no less engaging, I thought. Heterosexual romance, homosexual romance, and friendship are all kinds of love that are here. Part of what I find so great about C & L's writing is their fluid definitions of love and sexuality. I find myself feeling more at home there than in conventional show more romances. It's just more tolerant and equal - implicitly. It's like - not even worth talking about. Brilliant. show less

An adorable, sappy, punk rock, teenage romance that takes place in the span of one night. Nick is desperate, his ex-girlfriend the evil wench that broke his heart is at the club where his band is playing and he can't face her. She's already moved on, has a new boyfriend and he can't stop moping. When he sees her approaching him he turns to a random girl he doesn't know and pleads, "Will you please be my girlfriend for the next five minutes?" Thus starts a long night of punk music, burlesque show more nuns, disappointment, heartbreak, and ultimately, hope. I really hope the movie does this edgy provocative book justice because I really enjoyed it. The story is told in alternating viewpoints from both Nick and Norah. show less