Review: In Five Years by Rebecca Serle
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The Basics
Title: In Five Years
Author: Rebecca Serle
Published: 2020
Publisher: Atria Books - Simon & Schuster
Pages: 251
Format: Hardcover
Genres: Fiction — Contemporary fiction, Romance, Contemporary romance, Time travel, Magical realism
Book Synopsis
Dannie Kohan has her life all planned out. In five years, she’ll be a senior associate at Watchell, a prestigious corporate law firm in New York. Outside of work, she’ll be married to her long-time boyfriend, David, and they’ll be living in their dream neighborhood, Gramercy Park. In between being at home with David and at the office, she’ll also make time to visit her lifelong and free-spirited friend, Bella, who pokes fun at Dannie’s need to plan out everything in her life.
That five-year plan seems so perfect and attainable until one night when she falls asleep only to awaken five years in the future in an apartment that is not hers next to a man who is definitely not David. Although she spends only one hour in the future, that single hour has far-reaching effects, and just as she is making strides in forgetting the entire episode, she runs into the man from her vision. The more she runs from him and the future she saw, the more inevitable it all comes to seem.
My Review & Overall Thoughts
In Five Years was not at all what I expected it to be. Based on the description listed on the cover’s flap, I thought it would be a romance. Specifically, I thought the plot would roughly be that a woman wakes up five years in the future next a man she has never met, only to meet and end up with said man in the present day. You also might have assumed that would be the plot based on the book synopsis I gave, but you, just like me, would be mistaken. In Five Years is much more of a drama than a romance, as the relationship at the center of the book is not a romantic one but rather the friendship between Dannie and Bella. While the book involves romance, it is on the periphery; friendship, grief, loss, and love are at the forefront.
Love is a particular focus of this novel, with Rebecca Serle exploring the different flavors of love. Over the course of the story, we are exposed to three primary types of love: platonic, all encompassing, and faded. Dannie and Bella’s friendship falls into the first category, and their love is supportive, unconditional, and lifelong. Bella and Greg exemplify the all-encompassing type, where they are not only head over heels for one another but also emotionally supportive of each other. Dannie and David, on the other hand, have a faded, comfortable love. Theirs is the type of love where two people have been together for so long that the very length of the relationship becomes the primary reason for why they stay together. People in such a relationship love one another, but they are not in love with one another anymore. This contrast among the types of love is one of the most enjoyable aspects of the book.
Another laudable component of the book is its portrayal of cancer. As someone who has lost a loved one to cancer, I find In Five Years’ descriptions of the disease to be not only accurate but also compassionate. Rebecca Serle conveys the raw emotion and sense of helplessness that accompanies a cancer diagnosis, as well as the heavy toll that chemo takes on the human body – all while maintaining an empathetic, human perspective. The character with the cancer diagnosis is neither made into an object of pity nor a heroic figure, two common pitfalls of books or movies that deal with cancer. The strength of the character is emphasized but so is their humanness.
That humanness also comes through in the book’s ending. The book ends in a way that I could never have foreseen, but given the preceding events and emotional context, it makes sense. The only other thing that I will say about the ending is that I like that it has a hopeful tone to it.
The not so good
In Five Years’ story did not draw me in. I did not find myself eager to read it or hesitant to put it down; rather, I had to motivate myself to finish it. The major roadblock to my complete enjoyment of the book was Rebecca Serle’s writing. There were moments throughout the book, including the first chapter where a series of numbers and their accompanying significance are listed, that the writing came across as pretentious.
Overall
I enjoyed In Five Years more than I didn’t. It was a decent read with several redeeming qualities, and although I won’t be reading it again any time soon, I wouldn’t not recommend it. I would just caution against buying your own copy – borrow it from your library.
Have you read In Five Years? Did you have a similar reaction as me, or did you love the book? Let me know in the comments below!
