Emma Lord | Begin Again

The Book:

Begin Again by Emma Lord
Published January 24, 2023 by Wednesday Books
Date read: December 24, 2022

The Characters:

Andie
Milo

The Plot (from Goodreads):

As usual, Andie Rose has a plan: Transfer from community college to the hyper-competitive Blue Ridge State, major in psychology, and maintain her lifelong goal of becoming an iconic self-help figure despite the nerves that have recently thrown her for a loop. All it will take is ruthless organization, hard work, and her trademark unrelenting enthusiasm to pull it all together.

But the moment Andie arrives, the rest of her plans go off the rails. Her rocky relationship with her boyfriend Connor only gets more complicated when she discovers he transferred out of Blue Ridge to her community college. Her roommate Shay needs a major, and despite Andie’s impressive track record of being The Fixer, she’s stumped on how to help. And Milo, her coffee-guzzling grump of an R.A. with seafoam green eyes, is somehow disrupting all her ideas about love and relationships one sleep-deprived wisecrack at a time.

But sometimes, when all your plans are in rubble at your feet, you find out what you’re made of. And when Andie starts to find the power of her voice as the anonymous Squire on the school’s legendary pirate radio station–the same one her mom founded, years before she passed away–Andie learns that not all the best laid plans are necessarily the right ones.

Filled with a friend group that feels like family, an empowering journey of finding your own way, and a Just Kiss Already! romance, Begin Again is an unforgettable novel of love and starting again.

The Review:

Begin Again was a cute college story. It was good by New Adult standards–a genre I often dislike. We begin with the comical-but-easily-avoidable mishap described in the synopsis, and then follow Andie on her quest to fit in at her parents’ alma mater.

The story was cute if a little cheesy. It’s a very slow burn and very closed-door, but I loved the friendships Andie creates with the side characters.

There were a few things about Andie that irked me, like her “fixer” personality despite usually having bad advice, and her “too cute to cuss” habit. Very little attention is paid to classes in this book, and I have no idea how Andie wouldn’t be failing them all. Only one class was mentioned, which she was struggling with, and she never seemed to go to class itself, only office hours.

Overall, good but not great. I probably wouldn’t have read a physical copy, but the audiobook was a quick, enjoyable listen with good narration.

Follow me on Bloglovin’!