Notes from the Shelf

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In Five Years by Rebecca Serle is a 272-page romance novel with added magical realism. It’s about Type-A Manhattan lawyer Dannie Kohan. During the most important interview of her career, she’s asked where she sees herself in five years. Of course, she has a meticulously crafted answer ready and she nails the interview. Afterward, she accepts her boyfriend’s marriage proposal. Dannie goes to bed that night knowing she’s right on track to achieve her five-year goals.

But then she wakes up in a different apartment with a different ring on her finger next to a different man. The television news is on in the background with the date, December 15, 2025, five years to the day in the future.

After a very confusing intense hour, Dannie wakes again back in 2020 at midnight. She can’t shake what she’s experienced. It definitely felt more than a dream, but she doesn’t believe in nonsense like visions. She files it away until four and a half years later where she meets the very same man that appeared in her vision.

This book turned out to be very different from what I initially thought. The focus is much more on heartbreak and friendship than it is on romance, so I thought it was a bit misleading to classify it as a romance. I would say it was more contemporary fiction as it very much focuses on Dannie figuring out what she truly wants in life. It wasn’t a bad read, but I kept expecting for her to find the guy she saw in her vision and for them to be together, but it didn’t really happen like that. If it had been marketed as a contemporary fiction, I think I would give it more stars, but since it was marketed primarily as a romance from what I saw, I give In Five Years 3 stars.

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