© Amber HawkinsThe best-selling author talks to Shondaland about her new novel and the complications that come with the best-friend breakup.
Last year, New York Times best-selling author Emily Henry delivered perhaps one of the most devourable beach reads in recent memory. It was aptly titled Beach Read and depicted an opposites-attract tale of two vastly different writers who, while living next to each other in their respective beach houses and trying to beat writer's block, find they have more in common than they think.
Henry has made a name for herself in taking typical romance-novel tropes and adding modern twists. And, if you are indeed a fan of romance-novel tropes (much like me), then you've come to the right place. In Henry's new novel, People We Meet on Vacation, we've got friends-to-lovers. We've got opposites attract. We've got slow burns and almost moments - this novel has got it all and is all the better for it.
Alex and Poppy have been friends since college. They are the ultimate human balance, and, despite Alex's straitlaced ways and Poppy's fun-loving attitude, they're always there for each other. And, even when they live in different states, have different partners, and experience the unpredictable weirdness of life, they have one constant: their yearly trip together. Every year, the two best friends - who are just friends! They promise! - go away together to disconnect from the world, reconnect with each other, and strengthen their bond as friends.
© Berkley BooksPeople We Meet on Vacation
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One year, however, everything between Alex and Poppy goes up in flames, leading to the two not speaking for two years. After such an agonizingly long period of time, Poppy decides to make one last effort to repair the fragmented friendship. Alex somewhat surprisingly agrees, and the two embark on a weeklong vacation that could leave more questions than answers but, for we readers, is nothing but entertaining from start to finish.
Shondaland caught up with Emily Henry to talk about friend breakups, chemistry, being a pragmatic romantic, and more.
KATIE TAMOLA: I think friend breakups are slowly becoming one of the most-talked-about, less-destigmatized realities that a lot of people go through. Would you say that a friend breakup, and the attempt at repairing the fragmented relationship, is at the heart of your book?
EMILY HENRY: Absolutely! I think, culturally, we're seeing a shift where everything isn't quite so partner-centric - in real life and in media. Friendships can be every bit as heady and intense as romantic relationships, but the breakups are even more confusing because they're usually not quite so concrete as the end of a romantic relationship. A lot of times, you don't get the answers you hoped for, and the grieving process is strange because it's not something that used to be talked about so much, despite how relatable of a scenario it is.
KT: Alex and Poppy have this amazing human chemistry. They seem to just get each other. Your characters in Beach Read had lovely chemistry as well, but with this book the protagonists' chemistry really seems to stem from their deeply developed friendship. How did you get inspired to write characters who got along like this? Were you inspired by other people/friendships?
EH: I knew from the beginning that I wanted to write a dynamic similar to Harry and Sally in When Harry Met Sally where the characters have moments of true platonic intimacy, love, affection, and vulnerability, and gradually that transforms into something more - or maybe just different.
In a lot of friendships, in the early days, you're aware that you could turn the relationship into something romantic. It occurs to you that that might be an option, but once you're really close to someone, you also know what you'd be risking by messing with a good thing, and I wanted to create a really heightened version of that situation for Alex and Poppy where they've managed to go a decade being true, deep friends who are ultimately family to each other at this point.
That question - that what if - is always there, but it grows and shrinks depending on where they both are in life, but the friendship part is steadfast. Like Poppy, growing up I was a strange mix of pragmatic and romantic, so I think I was sort of half in love with everyone I met but also never willing to risk a friendship that meant a lot to me. The tricky thing for Alex and Poppy is they've gotten to this point in their lives where they really can't healthily mean quite as much to each other as they have, if they're going to be involved with other people, and that's what kind of forces them to make a decision.
KT: I think that a lot of people, including me, have prioritized this idea of an almost over-the-top, rom-com-fueled, chasing-you-at-the-airport-scene kind of loving-loudly concept. People We Meet on Vacation reminded me of the kind of quiet yet strong, beautiful ways people can love each other. How would you describe the love that Alex and Poppy share?
EH: Oh, I love that you mentioned the chasing-you-at-the-airport scene, because that really is such a staple of the golden age of the rom-com. It's so interesting, because that's the tradition I'm always aiming to write into, but I also very much want my characters to feel 100-percent real, and the scenarios they find themselves in are relatable rather than aspirational.
And I also so love that you describe their love as"quiet yet strong." Again, that kind of goes back to my being a pragmatic romantic. Grand gestures and romantic professions of love are great, but, at the end of the day, my favorite kind of love is always going to be the person who makes the mundane and even hard parts of life better. Sometimes, when we're doing something really boring or typical, my husband will tell me, if we weren't already married, he'd propose right then, and I always think, yeah, I'd say yes. When I was writing Alex and Poppy taking these amazing vacations, I wanted it to be clear that the best part was always just being together.
KT: Readers have to work to find out what causes the prominent rift in Alex and Poppy's relationship, and this is a book about the love that they share - platonic and possibly romantic - but it also is a book about both feeling anchored and ultimately losing that feeling. About halfway through the book, Poppy starts to ask herself if she wants the same things she once did, which I think many young people who are getting older can relate to. How do you decide which kind of"big questions" adults have to ask themselves to include in your novels?
EH: This is such an amazing question. For this point, that Big Question was actually the starting point of this book. It's usually not so much of a conscious decision: I just start writing about a character, and what they're going through emotionally becomes the heart of the book. But, in this case, my debut rom-com, Beach Read, was about to come out, and I was having a bit of a crisis.
I'd been in the publishing world for a while, and I spent the first couple years of that feeling like I was constantly striving, dreaming. Once I started meeting those goals, I was left with this strange emptiness. It's kind of like that birthday or Christmas feeling as a kid - like you have all this buildup, and then it's just over, and you are more or less the same as before, and so is your life.
So, I wanted to work that all out with Poppy by giving her her"dream life" and forcing her to confront that it didn't"fix" everything. So much of the book is about her untangling her identity from this one path she's spent most of her life on and accepting herself fully rather than hiding behind this facade she's built.
KT: Would you say that this book at all considers/challenges the concept of fate?
EH: Oh, that's such an interesting thought. I wasn't intentionally engaging with that, but I think it actually does. One thing that Alex and Poppy find is that the best parts of their trips are usually the ones they didn't plan - the split-second decisions or the times when things went wrong and forced them onto a new path. I'm not sure that I'd call it fate exactly, but I think that, in real life, that flexibility and openness so often leads to connecting with unexpected people in a way that feels almost preordained.
It's just a good reminder of how connected we all actually are. And I also think there's a bit of a question between Alex and Poppy: Are they"meant to be," or is this a decision where either path might work?
KT: What do you think makes for genuinely good romance? What's something you think must be present between two characters?
EH: Tension! I think, for stories in general, tension is what makes me want to keep reading and writing, whether that's romantic or some other kind. I also think that's why the enemies-to-lovers trope is always so popular. There's this built-in tension between the characters, and you just have to see how it builds or breaks.
Beyond that, I think it's the feeling that there is a world just for two, that they understand something about each other that no one else does, and they almost have their own secret language. That's what makes me really buy into a love story.
KT: What's one kind of story you haven't written yet that you'd absolutely love to?
EH: I write in pretty much every genre, which is the same way I read, so I'd love to publish some sci-fi or horror someday. But, as far as romance specifically, someday I really want to write a love story about two people who are married to each other and aren't sure they want to be still. I have a loose idea for one, so we'll see!
KT: What is something you're reading right now that you'd highly recommend to Shondaland readers?
EH: I've been reading so many amazing books, it's hard to choose. Katherine St. John's The Siren is a Liane Moriarty-esque thriller that I devoured. So We Meet Again by Suzanne Park was just so utterly cozy, sweet, and romantic. And The View Was Exhausting by Mikaella Clements and Onjuli Datta is a fantastically angsty love story with the most fantastic execution of the fake-dating trope.
Katie Tamola is a freelance writer who grew up in Manhattan. Find her on Twitter @katietamola.
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