Rating: ⭐⭐⭐⭐

“The greatest loves of your life are your friends.”

Oh, my heart 💗 After reading a dark thriller, this was just what I needed to pick up as a palate cleanser, and wow, what an absolute breath of fresh air this book is! A beautiful love letter to female friendships in all their forms. A tonic for the soul. It was pretty damn special! And the perfect book to pick up, seeing as today is Galentine’s Day! I’m so thrilled to be sharing my review for Galentine’s Day by Rebecca Anderson!

About the book

Thirteen years, three women, one sleepover.

13th February 2013. Alicia, Marnie and Hannah have a sleepover on Galentine’s Day, the day before Valentine’s Day, for the first time. They’re eighteen, single, and the world is at their feet. Tomorrow, they’ll go their separate ways, to university, to a job, to a different country. But they promise that every year, they’ll have their annual sleepover.

13th February 2026. After thirteen years of faithful attendance at their annual sleepover, only two women are attending this year. Their friendship has seen partying, breakdowns, marriages, kids, divorces, and everything in between, but are their best Galentine’s Days now behind them?

The beginning

I knew this book would be fun, fabulous and full of feels straight away, and it was everything I needed right now! I love a book where you just know what you’ll be getting from the start, and I sunk into this feeling like I’d known Hannah, Marcie and Alicia my whole life. Three close friends, but with such different personalities, friends who had a tradition they’d managed to uphold since their college days. Every 13th February, Galentine’s Day, they’d promised to have a sleepover together. No matter how old they were, what stage of their lives they were in, they agreed to spend this one time of year with each other. And what a beautiful tradition. We start the book in the present day, where things feel strained. Only two of them could make the annual sleepover, and I was already concerned about how things got to this point, what was going on in their lives. But then we’re taken back to 2013, where it all began. I loved getting to know these girls properly, the humour, their banter, the life of a three-piece friendship taking me back. It felt so relatable at times and I smiled a lot reading this!

“Life is scary, but as long as we have each other we’ll be just fine.”

The girls have a group chat; Hot Mess Express. And in between the different POVs from different Galentine’s Days over the years, the author mixes up the narrative by including snippets of these chats over time, which really helped to bridge those time gaps and speed things up where it was needed. It worked so well, and there are so many trends and memorable moments mentioned that I had completely forgotten about… the blue and black dress for one (no, it wasn’t white and gold!) I loved how these girls always had each other’s backs, no matter what they’ve got going on in their lives at any one time. I did feel the book was a little too YA for my liking at the start, but that soon changed as these girls grew into women, got partners, brought up children. I was so drawn into the messy times, the fun times, the serious times. Even when there is friction or heated conversations between them, they always kissed and made up not long after. You can really feel the strength of their friendship, even when it’s tested. The portrayal of friendships in general is so realistic.

The middle

I feel jealousy in friendships can be very real. Even though you can love your friends so deeply, it can sometimes feel difficult to celebrate their wins, even though you are still happy for them. There could be so many reasons for this; maybe you’d been desperately craving this “thing” for yourself, yet it hasn’t happened. Or it may feel like someone is constantly having good things happen to them, while you seem to have so much bad come your way. This is explored so well in this book! There is a reveal here that I saw coming, and I made the connection early, but I did feel certain characters overreacted to something that really wasn’t that big of a deal? Like things were overdramatised? There was a bit of eyerolling from me, but then I had to tell myself that these were female friendships. They can be over the top, they can be messy as hell. Reaching Covid times in the book really did take me back, and I loved how the author had nailed every detail. The fear of the unknown, the frustration, the anger, the sadness. There really is so much packed into this book that all of us can relate to in some way. It felt very special!

“Alicia didn’t know why people felt it was okay to comment on a couple’s choice to have or not have kids. For all they knew, Alicia and Hugh had been trying, or they’d been pregnant or miscarried. People just needed to shut up.” 👏

I found all of these characters and their lives to be so wonderfully developed, but it was Hannah who was the one I loved to see succeed the most. It takes her longer to get settled than the other girls, and for a while she was the one who wanted what they had. She was more rebellious, more happy-go-lucky than they were. Not really knowing where she wanted to be. But when her life starts to get exciting and all her hard work over recent times pays off, I felt like cheering! She was quite an inspirational character for me and at times, I saw a little bit of myself in her. We see a big argument between Hannah and Alicia, and throughout the book so far, I did sense something off between the two. A clash of personalities maybe, even though they’d been friends for years. Yet it was this one misunderstanding that caused this relationship to crumble. We see so much fun between the three of these women over the years, but now, things weren’t the same. I wasn’t sure if this was something that could be properly repaired. Would their Galentine’s Day tradition come to an end?

The end

I loved the maturity of the book here, how we’d seen the girls grow from being college graduates to women with responsibilities. It made me think about how fast life goes by, something I’ve been thinking about a lot lately anyway. There were serious topics explored which I really appreciated, things that aren’t really covered a lot in fiction. The whole discussion about whether to have kids, or not have kids. The expectations from others, the pressure from those around you (and those who aren’t) the reality that people don’t know when to keep their mouths shut over the whole thing. How Alicia finally voices the fact that no, she doesn’t want children after always thinking she did or ‘should’ was such a breath of fresh air for me. I think everyone should read this, even if it’s just for one particular discussion Alicia has with the gals! Utterly perfect. It screams how important conversations are, why we need our friends in our lives, the beauty of advice from those whose opinions matter to you. Yeah, this part of the book will really stay with me for all the right reasons!

“There is was again, the head versus the heart conundrum. Why did some people find it so easy to follow their heart without the evidence or logic to back it up?”

I had a cry at the end of this book because there was one little, powerful paragraph that was so relatable to me in that exact moment that it was a little overwhelming and I couldn’t hold it in. But even so, the author approaches every single sensitive topic so delicately and beautifully, and I just couldn’t fault that aspect. This part of the book in particular really made me think about life, what and who is important, what my priorities should be. One of the most thought-provoking books I’ve read in recent years. There’s healing, growth, hope, promises and compromises, and these characters’ journeys were so inspiring, especially at the end. Knowing they’d stuck together, weathered all their storms together was something so uplifting that despite the sad parts, I smiled as I finished that last page. There was such a lovely, strong message throughout the ending; do what makes you happy, do what makes you feel good inside, what fills your heart. Life is too short not to do so. If you need a book full of positivity and the importance of good friendships, this is perfect 💕

Overall thoughts

Galentine’s Day seemed to analyse every single friendship I’ve had over the years and squish them into the forms of Marnie, Alicia and Hannah. These three very different girls bonded at college and made a promise; that every single year on 13th February – Galentine’s Day – they would come together for a sleepover, no matter what stage of life they were in and no matter what they had going on. We follow the girls as they have thirteen Galentine’s Days together over thirteen years, and aside from their Galentine’s shenanigans, there are snippets of their group chats which mixed things up a bit and had me laughing!

We see these girls grow into women, balance their friendship with the absolute rollercoaster that is life. But the one thing that stays consistent over time is their ability to love one another, to give advice, to build each other up, to be there for one another during the good times and the bad (and boy do they have both). Storms are weathered, achievements are celebrated. But I think this book goes so much deeper than all that.

The book is such an accurate portrayal of how friendships change. How your friendships as teens look a lot different to friendships you have as adults, and that is perfectly normal. The relationships in this book are so real and relatable, and I shared the joyous moments and the heartbreak with all my being. But aside from all that, this was such a fun read! I laughed, I smiled, I relished in the nostalgia that’s explored over the years which was so brilliantly written. What a gorgeous, gorgeous book. I guarantee you’ll see a little bit of yourself in this book. Memorable, heartfelt and so relatable!

Huge thank you to the author, Rebecca Anderson, and the fabulous team at Avon Books for my copy of Galentine’s Day! You can grab your own copy right now over on Amazon or wherever you buy your books. Make sure you’re following Rebecca over on Instagram for more updates.

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