Notes from the Shelf

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Funny Story by Emily Henry is a 400-page romance novel. Daphne loves the way her fiancé Peter tells their story: how they met, fell in love, and moved back to his lakeside hometown to start a life together. He’s so much better at telling their love story than Daphne, that is until he realizes he’s in love with his childhood best friend Petra, kicking Daphne out of his house.

Daphne must begin her new story, where she is stranded in Waning Bay, Michigan, far away from her family but with a dream job as a children’s librarian. She proposes to be roommates with the only person who can understand her predicament: Petra’s ex, Miles Nowak.

Miles is scruffy and chaotic with a habit of taking solace heartbreaking love ballads. He is the opposite of practical, buttoned up Daphne, whose coworkers know so little about that they bet she’s with the FBI or under witness protection. Miles and Daphne mostly avoid each other until one day, while drowning their sorrows, form a friendship and a plan, which involves posting deliberately misleading photos to social media to get a rise out of their exes. Nothing has ever gone wrong with pretending to be in a relationship, right?

I absolutely loved Funny Story; I think it’s my favorite Emily Henry book I’ve read so far. The pacing of the story and the voice of the narrator felt different than her other books, which I thought felt fresh and made it more interesting compared to the other books.

Each chapter had a countdown for how many more days Daphne has to stay for her Read-a-thon at the library; once it’s over, she plans to move, perhaps back by her mother. I loved that halfway through, the countdown on the chapter changed to “days until I can leave (if I want to).” I thought it was a cute addition, even though it does go away later.

I thought the way Miles and Daphne interacted was very cute; it melted my heart the way he took her to do local things once he found out Peter never took Daphne anywhere local since she moved there. I liked the balance of Miles being protective of Daphne and indignant with the way Peter had been treating her, but it never felt like he was overbearing.

I absolutely hated Peter and Petra; they seemed so self-absorbed and insecure. A perfect match for each other. I can’t believe Peter came crawling back to Daphne when Petra and him called off their wedding. I’m glad she didn’t get back with him, and I’m glad Miles didn’t get back with Petra. Miles seemed much more into the plan to win back their exes, so I’m glad he had changed his mind by then.

I also like that Emily Henry included a nod to Beach Read by having Miles and Daphne go to North Bear Shores to the same bookstore that did the book club in Beach Read. I thought it was fun to see it was in the same universe.

I absolutely adored the ending and how Daphne now loves to tell their love story when she had hated to tell her and Peter’s story. I thought it was great character growth and made me so happy for them.

I give Funny Story 5 stars.

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Read my other Emily Henry reviews:

Beach Read

People We Meet on Vacation
Book Lovers

Happy Place
Great Big Beautiful Life

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