Dueling point-of-view story from Erin and James as they navigate life after the loss of high school friend Bonnie and their own friendship.
Both Erin and James’ present and future is bleak. Life isn’t going anywhere near as planned, until James stumbles across a heavily annotated book that never should have been in the ‘little library’ in the first place.
Little does James know, Erin is the annotated author. An idea sparks… should they book swap? Both don’t know the other is who they are talking to. What will happen when they find out? Can hearts heal after so much time?
What is the most exciting part of this book is I love this idea! I initially had the idea from the book S. By: JJ Abrams (you should read it/get your hands on it if you can). I did a few ‘buddy reads’ where we passed/mailed the book back and forth leaving our thoughts in the margin as we went. It was really fun!
Anyways, back to the review of The Book Swap … overall, cute idea. Execution … eh. The first 10% was rough. I wanted to DNF, but I hate doing that to ARCs, so I kept with it.
The rest of the book wasn’t bad, persay. But it was so slow. Painfully slow. The only category I’d place this book in is, “Snail Romance”.
On top of the pace, Erin is so unlikable, so selfish, daft .. it’s hard to root for her. On the other hand, James is so likable you just really wish he would move on with his life. I’m a big believer in, you don’t have to like the characters to like the book. In romance genre though, maybe you do. The reader has to be wanting this to work out because they are so invested in the characters.
If you take out all the romance and overarching plot line … this book has a lot of fun nuggets that saved it for me. Actual quote from actual good books, books that all readers would love. The book swap idea, again, so cute and could inspire any reader to get together with a friend and do the same. For me, I was reading for these type of nuggets and the nuggets didn’t disappoint.
For me, this was an overall boring, anti romance. I would not recommend to my friends, but I would tell them about the ‘nuggets’ I found while reading this book. If I had a physical copy I would love to annotate the heck out of it.
Amazon Link – The Book Swap By: Tessa Bickers
***Thank you to Harlequin Trade Publishing, NetGalley and of course, Tessa Bickers, for a copy of the ARC in exchange for an honest review. Publishing on Sept 03, 2024.
A book-lovers dream! References to the following classics can be found in The Book Swap.
- TO KILL A MOCKINGBIRD
- GREAT EXPECTATIONS
- WUTHERING HEIGHTS
- MANSFIELD PARK
- THE GREAT GATSBY
- MIDDLEMARCH
- BELOVED
- ON THE ROAD
- THE BELL JAR
cmacs paperbacks 
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