A NEW YORK TIMES BESTSELLER A Good Morning America, FabFitFun, and Marie Claire Book Club Pick “In Five Years is as clever as it is moving, the rare read-in-one-sitting novel you won’t forget.” –Chloe Benjamin, New York Times bestselling author of The Immortalists Perfect for fans of Me Before You and One Day–a striking, powerful, and moving love story following an ambitious lawyer who … fans of Me Before You and One Day–a striking, powerful, and moving love story following an ambitious lawyer who experiences an astonishing vision that could change her life forever.
Where do you see yourself in five years?
Dannie Kohan lives her life by the numbers.
She is nothing like her lifelong best friend–the wild, whimsical, believes-in-fate Bella. Her meticulous planning seems to have paid off after she nails the most important job interview of her career and accepts her boyfriend’s marriage proposal in one fell swoop, falling asleep completely content.
But when she awakens, she’s suddenly in a different apartment, with a different ring on her finger, and beside a very different man. Dannie spends one hour exactly five years in the future before she wakes again in her own home on the brink of midnight–but it is one hour she cannot shake. In Five Years is an unforgettable love story, but it is not the one you’re expecting.
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Great, unique story that could have gone a million different ways. I love how it all came together in the end. Had me worried there for a minute. This was my first book by the author, and I enjoyed it very much. Lots of emotion, and having gone through cancer treatment myself last year, I was nodding along to how the process was described. Sadly, on point. Check it out!
Song/s the book brought to mind: Wonderwall by Oasis
Well thank you to Rebecca Serle for completely breaking my heart with In Five Years. It was not at all what I expected, and you better be prepared to cry your eyes out, I sure did!
Don’t you love when a book completely surprises you in a good way? I sure do, and that’s what In Five Years did to me. It may be a short book at 250 pages, but it is bursting with heart and will give you ALL the feels. Friendship, heartbreak, loss, hope, love – it’s all here folks! I thought it was a book about time travel, but wow was I sure wrong. I think the synopsis is slightly misleading but I’m almost happy it is, and I have never said that! I don’t think it’s good to know too much about it, just know you’ll need lots of tissues.
I both listened to and read the book and I loved both ways so much. The narrator for In Five Years, Megan Hilty, was fantastic and she did a great job with her inflections, pauses and everything else. It sounded like she put her heart and soul into reading Dannie and I really appreciated that. Clearly I highly recommend the audio if that is how you like to enjoy your books.
This was my first time reading a novel by Serle but I’m not going to hold off reading her book before this (The Dinner List) any longer! Now please excuse me while I pick the pieces of my heart up and put it back together…
Thank you to Libro.fm and the publisher for both my advance listening copy and advance review copy. All opinions and thoughts are my own.
This a great read from a new author.
It is heartbreaking which took me by surprise – so have the tissues ready! It had a different style of writing to what I like but it was still very good. I look forward to reading more books from this author.
I’m a planner, just like the narrator in this book and I’m not happy when life feels out of control (as it does right now, ha!) This book seems to be a romance at first, but it’s really a story of a woman’s journey of self-discovery. A moving read.
4 Stars!
Dannie Kohan is a young, ambitious, Manhattan corporate lawyer who is extremely passionate about her job. She’s worked hard to get to where she is, and is determined to succeed. Everything in her life is planned and predictable. She stays in her comfort zone, and is a type A personality. She thinks she has everything figured out, and is on track to soon being engaged and landing her dream job at the top firm in the city. She has an interview for a job that will make her career, and they ask her the typical question… Where do you see yourself in five years?
Dannie nails her interview, and then goes to sleep that night feeling she had everything she could ever want. The perfect man, and the perfect career. Then she wakes up in a different apartment with a gorgeous stranger that isn’t her fiancé. It’s the same night, but it’s five years later in 2025. When she wakes again she’s back in her normal life in 2020, but she feels rattled and can’t shake the memory of the man that felt so real to her. She can’t quit thinking about him, but tries to put it in the back of her mind. Then four and a half years later she crosses paths with the man from her vision. Was he a premonition of her destiny, and what will become of her future?
In Five Years by Rebecca Serle is a deeply emotional, heartbreakingly beautiful story about soulmates and friendship. It’s about love, loss, fate, and indescribable connections. This was a unique, unforgettable story packed with all the feels!
Dannie Cohan is on the right path in her five year plan personally and professionally – a budding lawyer on a path to a successful career and a stable relationship with her fiancée. Her meticulously planned life suddenly takes a turn when a vivid dream takes her 5 years into the future Dec 15, 2025, wearing a different ring, in a different apartment, and with a different man! She wakes up back into the present in 2020, but can’t seem to shake off how real the vision was and have always kept her vision tucked away in the back of her mind. Fast forward 4.5 yrs later and she runs into the same man in her vision and the series of events that follows are what makes this book completely and utterly clever, moving, and heartbreaking.
I loved how the course of life’s unexpected moments and the unpredictable nature of destiny will take its course no matter what we do to try to avoid it.
I loved this book for the characters, the plot twists, and the beautiful relationships between life-long friends and the power to love and be loved.
In Five Years started, for me, as a romance book. Two people in 2020 are living together, in love, getting engaged but then there was a twist. Dannie has a dream that she is in 2025 and that her life is different from what she is living now. It was a dream, right? It couldn’t have really happened, could it?
I love how her life in 2020 continues, she gets her dream job, she is with a wonderful man but is she really happy? I had many thoughts while enjoying this book. I wondered how many people settle in life, how many people wish their life could change and would they be happier if it changed? While Dannie doesn’t really want a different life, is she settling with her life?
The story of Dannie and her best friend broke my heart. I had tears rolling down my face as their story was told. Their friendships were so true. They fought, they loved, and they protected each other. Even while not getting along they did things for each other, just because they knew the other would appreciate or need it.
This is my first book by Rebecca Serle and I look forward to reading more. The twists, the friendships, the love, and the story are all amazing and I recommend picking up your own copy.
In Five Years by Rebecca Serle is a very well written and moving novel. It is story of a young and resourceful workaholic corporate lawyer, Dannie Cohan, who eventually finds her true self by virtue of her relationship with her best and most trusted friend. An endearing aspect of Serle’s writing is that these friends are polar opposites, and the author exquisitely reveals how loyalty and their troubled childhoods kept them together.
Now as adults, it seems that Dannie has everything under control compared to her whimsical friend Bella or does she? Bella, on the other hand, seems ready to settle down and be more like Dannie. Tragedy then hits their world and they realize it takes both their personalities and their strong bond to cope. The result is Serle’s poignant depiction of the boundless love between friends. Character development of each heroine through each other’s eyes is both refreshing and humorous. Serle also completely nails Manhattan, the intensity of corporate law and deal making, and the difficulty of achieving work/life balance in that environment.
The bond between Dannie and Bella as written by Serle deftly reminds us what is important in life. While I didn’t like the “hook” of the five-year premonition and its (unbelievable) resolution, I have to admit that the anticipation caused will keep some readers turning pages. For me, the quality of Serle’s writing was all I needed.
4.5 stars
3.5 stars
When I read the synopsis of In Five Years, I was immediately intrigued and couldn’t wait to read it. I was expecting an epic love story, and I did get one, just not the one that I thought I would. I do not consider In Five Years a romance and would categorize it more as women’s fiction. Readers should not expect a light and fluffy love story. There are romantic elements, but to me it was more a poignant celebration of friendship and sisterhood.
I really enjoyed Rebecca Serle’s writing overall, but I did feel that the pacing of the book was a little slow at times and overly detailed in certain areas. It made the book feel too long, and took away some of the emotional impact. The flash forward scene was done extremely well though and I loved how everything came together in the end. I’m still not really sure how to feel about the pseudo-love triangle that developed and how it concluded, but I can understand how grief and emotion could contribute to that outcome. Dannie, Bella, David, and Aaron were all likeable characters, but I didn’t truly connect with or love any of them. I was invested enough in the story though to read this book in one sitting. I appreciated the message/theme that we cannot control life no matter how much we may want to and that there’s a peace in letting go. Overall, an enjoyable read, but not quite what I was expecting.
*I voluntarily read an advance review copy of this book*
What would you do if you glimpsed your life five years from now — and found that it was different, in every way, from what you hoped for and expected? Rebecca Serle pairs this inspired premise with deft, propulsive prose and characters who feel as real as friends. In Five Years is as clever as it is moving, the rare read-in-one-sitting novel you won’t forget.
In Five Years is more than just a love story; it’s a half dozen of them, none quite what you expect. Heartwarming, heartbreaking, and hard to put down, it’s a novel about romance, friendship, the magic of good bagels, and what happens after you get everything you always wanted.
I just finished In Five Years and — my heart — oh! What a clever, beautiful, special book. The writing is stunning, the concept is so original — it just has everything going for it. I loved every page.
With masterful storytelling and all the ingredients of a romantic comedy, Rebecca Serle weaves a story far deeper than the genre typically dares to go. In Five Years isn’t simply a book you will read, it is a book that will change you.
I read it in one late night. Very, very clever. And lovely. The end is EXACTLY what it should be.
In Five Years by Rebecca Serle is the most beautiful contemporary novel celebrating friendship and love. It made me smile and it made me cry as the love radiated from its pages.
We do not always realise what we have until it is gone. Love creeps us on us over the years before overwhelming us. We know we are part of a great love because of the pain in parting.
Rebecca Serle celebrates a best buddy friendship in the novel – two girls meet aged seven, they grow up together and share the highs and lows, the ups and downs, the loves and losses in life. They appear to be complete opposites but their personalities complement each other as they support each other through life. Theirs is a beautiful friendship that will warm the reader’s heart.
We make our plans. We do everything on our lists but still life does not pan out the way we thought it would.
As we travel through life there will be losses that devastate. We will need to find a way through the grief in order to live again.
In Five Years was one of the most beautiful books that I have ever read. Love and friendship radiated from its pages. It made me cry but it left me feeling hopeful as I had witnessed a great love unfolding. It would make a fabulous film. Simply put – this is a beautiful novel.
I received this book for free. A favourable review was not required and all views expressed are my own.
An impactful look at love, loyalty and loss. Dannie provides a glimpse into the struggles of life. She is a planner; everything has a schedule and purpose. At her dream job interview, she knows exactly where she will be in 5 years which leads to her engagement to her long-time boyfriend, David. What she doesn’t expect is to wake up in a different bedroom in 2025 with a different man next to her. This dream shakes Dannie’s foundation more than she will admit as she works to bury what she experienced. The one constant during Dannie’s life is her best friend, Bella. They met when they were 7 and just clicked. Bella is the free-spirit in Dannie’s structured world. Dannie is a complex woman, she is driven to achieve her goals but deep down, there is pain that has never healed from the loss of her brother at a young age. Through this journey, she has to face that grief as live throws new challenges her way that test her plans. Yes, I was in tears as this story unfolded. This is beautifully told in a way that allowed me to be Dannie and experience all the highs and lows with her. I voluntarily read an ARC of this book and this is my honest review.
This book wasn’t what I was expecting at all, and I probably wouldn’t have read it if I’d known the storyline, but that would have been a mistake because I loved it. Beautifully-written, clever and moving, I’ll be thinking about In Five Years for a long time.
Thank you Netgalley, Atria Books/ Simon & Schuster, and Rebecca Serle for my ARC of In Five Years.
What do I even say, I’m in tears. This book has brought tears to my eyes. I’m embarrassed because I’m full on crying from a book I just finished. I’m speechless from all the emotions I have going through me right now.
In Five Years will have you fully invested. You will not put this book down, you will not keep yourself from crying, you will be emotionally invested to this book, and you will use a whole box of tissues.
You pick this book up thinking your about to read a love story between a couple. You think it’s just another love story. It’s not just your ordinary love story, it’s so much more. You think you know how this book will end, but you don’t.
I only wish the part about how Dannie has her dream/premonition was something more dramatic. Along the lines of her hitting her head, something falling on her head, something more. Not falling asleep from to much champagne.
4.5 stars
Wow! I literally could not put this book down. I shirked adult responsibilities just to read this to completion (thank god for frozen pizza). I was enthralled from the very first page until the bitter end… not that the end was bitter. It’s just a saying.
Dannie is a lawyer, at a job interview for the company she has aspired to work for since she was little. She is asked the simple question of ‘where do you see yourself in five years?’. She has the response perfected to a ‘t’: a senior partner within the company she is interviewing for, married to her boyfriend of 2.5 years, and living in Gramercy Park. Celebrating her job interview, her boyfriend David, proposes. Things seem to be headed in the right direction for her five year plan.
That night, after falling asleep, Dannie wakes up 5 years in the future to different surroundings, a different ring on her finger and a different man in her apartment. After some time in the future, Dannie wakes back up in 2020, completely distressed. Feeling out of control for a type a personality is/was hard for Dannie to swallow. The situation seemed more something she would expect to happen to her best friend Bella.
4.5 years later, Dannie meets the man from her vision. Here the story stretches out, as things aren’t how she thought them to be.
This story took so many twists and turns; I was not expecting the outcome of this book and I absolutely loved it. This book has all things you could ask for in a book, romance, the feeling of things out of your control, dogged determination, complacency, surprise, friendship and above all else love.
This is my first time reading a book by Rebecca Searle and am glad I was given a chance to review this. This is definitely a top book for 2020.
In Five Years was an interesting and emotional read. It had a lead woman character unlike most that star in the books I read. She’s very strong, organized, driven by numbers, logic, and goals. Her life is outlined and makes sense on paper. Her best friend is so the opposite. I don’t want to give anything away but this took me on a direction I didn’t see coming. I cried, I was surprised, I was invested. I maybe wouldn’t categorize it as a romance, but there is definitely love.