The 6 Best Emily Henry Books You Need to Read: In Order

1. Happy Place by Emily Henry

Harriet and Wyn have been the perfect couple since they met in college—they go together like salt and pepper, honey and tea, lobster and rolls. Except, now—for reasons they’re still not discussing—they don’t. They broke up six months ago. And still haven’t told their best friends. Which is how they find themselves sharing the largest bedroom at the Maine cottage that has been their friend group’s yearly getaway for the last decade.

Only this year, Harriet and Wyn are lying through their teeth while trying not to notice how desperately they still want each other. Because the cottage is for sale and this is the last week they’ll all have together in this place. After years of being in love, how hard can it be to fake it for one week… in front of those who know you best?

My Rating: ★★★★★

Happy Place has taken the top spot in my rankings of the best Emily Henry books. It seems that with each new book that Emily Henry publishes, the better they get.

Happy Place gripped my heart and had me fully invested from the outset. I’m not usually a fan of the switching of past and present storytelling, but it really worked in this novel and I would almost go back and read it again.

The best of the best Emily Henry books in this list.

2. Book Lovers by Emily Henry

Nora Stephens’ life is books—she’s read them all—and she is not that type of heroine. Not the plucky one, not the laidback dream girl, and especially not the sweetheart. In fact, the only people Nora is a heroine for are her clients, for whom she lands enormous deals as a cutthroat literary agent, and her beloved little sister Libby.

Which is why she agrees to go to Sunshine Falls, North Carolina for the month of August when Libby begs her for a sisters’ trip away—with visions of a small-town transformation for Nora, who she’s convinced needs to become the heroine in her own story. But instead of picnics in meadows, or run-ins with a handsome country doctor or bulging-forearmed bartender, Nora keeps bumping into Charlie Lastra, a bookish brooding editor from back in the city. It would be a meet-cute if not for the fact that they’ve met many times and it’s never been cute.

My Rating: ★★★★★

Book Lovers was the final book I read in summer 2022, while getting over Bali jet lag. I’ve now realised small town romance is my favourite trope and this is exactly what this was.

A book editor and book agent who aren’t very fond of each other just so happen to be staying in the same small town and well, I’m sure you can guess what happens.

Emily Henry basically makes fun of every cliche from every romance book in Book Lovers and I loved it. Incredibly predictable, but still so good and one of the best Emily Henry books to read.

3. Great Big Beautiful Life by Emily Henry

Alice Scott is a sunshiney aspiring writer, Hayden Anderson is a broody Pulitzer winner—and both are competing to write the biography of elusive heiress Margaret Ives.

Invited to her island estate for a one-month trial, they must charm Margaret, outwit each other, and resist the inconvenient attraction sparking between them… while piecing together a story neither is getting in full.

My Rating: ★★★★

Emily Henry’s most recent release, Great Big Beautiful Life received a lot of mixed reviews online when it was first published, so I was quite apprehensive going into it.

However, since I’ve read every book by Emily Henry, I couldn’t not read it. Plus, I rated her most recent release prior to this, Happy Place, five stars, so I still had high hopes.

I felt there were similar themes in Great Big Beautiful Life that we see in The Seven Husbands of Evelyn Hugo by Taylor Jenkins Reid, where the writing of a memoir is involved. Even though Great Big Beautiful Life was incredibly slow and a lot longer than I felt it needed to be, it was still highly enjoyable.

I would have liked more insight into the celebrity Margaret Ives’s story (and maybe a family tree diagram) and less focus on the small town and romance as it was a very slow burn, but again, I did really enjoy it and would highly recommend reading it.

4. You and Me on Vacation by Emily Henry

Two friends. Ten summer trips. Their last chance to fall in love. 12 summers ago: Poppy and Alex meet. They hate each other, and are pretty confident they’ll never speak again. 11 summers ago: They’re forced to share a ride home from college and by the end of it a friendship is formed. And a pact: every year, one vacation together.

10 summers ago: Alex discovers his fear of flying on the way to Vancouver. Poppy holds his hand the whole way. 7 summers ago: They get far too drunk and narrowly avoid getting matching tattoos in New Orleans. 2 summers ago: It all goes wrong. This summer: Poppy asks Alex to join her on one last trip. A trip that will determine the rest of their lives.

My Rating: ★★★★

Keeping with the vacation theme in the title of this books, I read this while on a sun lounger at a beach club in Rhodes.

It honestly couldn’t have been a better location to get lost in this book. This is the perfect summer read and one of the best Emily Henry books. I loved that it was told in different stages of the characters lives, mixing between past and present.

5. Beach Read by Emily Henry

Augustus Everett is an acclaimed author of literary fiction. January Andrews writes bestselling romance. When she pens a happily ever after, he kills off his entire cast. They’re polar opposites. In fact, the only thing they have in common is that for the next three months, they’re living in neighboring beach houses, broke, and bogged down with writer’s block. Until, one hazy evening, one thing leads to another and they strike a deal designed to force them out of their creative ruts: Augustus will spend the summer writing something happy, and January will pen the next Great American Novel.

My Rating: ★★★★

I saved this book for a long time purposely, so I could read it on the beach. With a title like Beach Read, where else could I simply read this book?

So I took it on my holiday to Rhodes, Greece (you can watch my YouTube vlog of the trip here) and read it in the sunshine while lying on a sun lounger by the water. Bliss.

I enjoyed the book and it was just what I expected in a typical summer rom-com type trope. However, it sounded like it was set in the woods in the Mid West of America, not anywhere sunny or near the beach.

In fact, I’m failing to remember a beach even being mentioned in the book. It wasn’t giving me the summer-filled sunshine romance that I was hoping for, so that knocked a star off.

6. Funny Story by Emily Henry

Daphne always loved the way her fiancé Peter told their story. How they met (on a blustery day), fell in love (over an errant hat), and moved back to his lakeside hometown to begin their life together. He really was good at telling it…right up until the moment he realized he was actually in love with his childhood best friend Petra. Which is how Daphne begins her new story: Stranded in beautiful Waning Bay, Michigan, without friends or family but with a dream job as a children’s librarian (that barely pays the bills), and proposing to be roommates with the only person who could possibly understand her predicament: Petra’s ex, Miles Nowak.

My Rating: ★★★

This was one of my most anticipated reads of 2024. But, unfortunately it didn’t live up to what I’d read online.

I had seen so many five-star reviews for this book from my favourite book creators but I just couldn’t get into it. It was a weird trope from the outset, seemed a little unrealistic and didn’t grip me at all. Not my favourite in this list of best Emily Henry books.