Benjamin Ashford|Emily Henry does it again. Romantic 'Funny Story' satisfies without tripping over tropes

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The weather is getting warmer, so obviously it's time for another banger read from Emily Henry.

For a subset of millennial women, the author has become a summer staple. Freewheeling romances that defy the stereotypes of "beach reads" (starting with her 2020 debut cheekily titled, "Beach Read"), Henry has become a reliable source of yearly can't-put-them-down stories about love, friendships and getting older.

Her latest, "Funny Story" (available now from Berkley Hardcover, pp. 410) takes the traditional "opposites attract" narrative and gives a realistic, if somewhat tragic twist. Children’s librarian Daphne Vincent (Henry’s characters always love to read) has moved to a idyllic Lake Michigan beach town with her fiancé Peter, slotting herself into his preferred life and the house he bought.

• "Funny Story" at Amazon for $19
• "Funny Story" at Bookshop.org for $27

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But when Peter leaves her for his childhood best friend just weeks before their wedding, Daphne doesn’t have a place to live. She winds up bunking with Miles, the ex-boyfriend of Peter’s new love. He's a punky, fun-loving charmer who everybody loves, and she's bookish and reserved. They don’t have anything in common except their shared heartbreak, but isn’t that just the perfect setting for new romance? 

It certainly checks a lot of rom-com set up boxes, but Henry wisely keeps Daphne’s journey far from perfect. There is real grief and trauma here, plus a loss of self and identity. Before Daphne can even think about falling in love with Miles, she has to start loving and knowing herself again. Maybe that’s not the stuff of traditional beach fluff, but for so many women who have been lost in romance in an unhealthy way, it’s deeply cathartic. And once the time for romance is right, Henry doesn't disappoint. It's sweet, passionate, and just hot enough to steam up the book, if not set it on fire.

Just like in her other novels, the author's characters are deep, realistic and relatable. Daphne is quiet and guarded, having grown up with an absentee father she has no faith in anyone to live up to her expectations. Gregarious Miles has more issues than meet the eye, and unfolding his inner life takes the reader on an unexpected journey as he and Daphne become friends, and something more.

Henry is so particularly talented at creating romance that eschews tropes and clichés but still satisfies our innate desire for predictability and happy endings in this genre. It's certainly not easy to balance the comfortingly formulaic with the tantalizingly unique. "Story" might hit the mark best of all of Henry's books so far.

It's a funny story, how she does it, actually. You should take a read.

• "Funny Story" at Amazon for $19
• "Funny Story" at Bookshop.org for $27