Book Review: This Time Next Year | Sophie Cousens

This was actually the last book I read in 2020 but I am just now reviewing it and honestly picking it up today to page through as I sat to write my review made me excited to read it again someday! I think British romance books are the perfect sort for me. They tend to be more of what in the US we would call contemporary fiction, but with an HEA.

Yes, this centers around a love story, but so much of the book is really about each of the characters learning and growing on their own, before they can find their way to happiness in life and love. Sometimes I’ll see someone criticize a book and say that they disliked XYZ about the characters, and it confuses me. I can’t imagine anything more boring than a book with perfect characters. I want characters who are flawed but good at their core, who make mistakes and can be messy, but who show growth and who I cheer for.

Minnie Cooper has always known she was born unlucky. From being born the second baby of the New Year (but not the first), things never seem to work out for Minnie. And she especially hates her birthday, which happens to be New Years Day. That is the unluckiest of all unlucky days for her. Until one year she meets a boy named Quinn who also happens to be born on New Years Day.

And as their stories unfold, we learn that Minnie and Quinn’s paths have crossed so many times before. It feels like they were born under the same star, one with all the privilege in the world and the other with all the misfortune. But appearances can be deceiving… Neither of their lives is what someone on the outside might think looking in. The more they find out about eachother, the more they realize that this strange friendship they’ve formed could be something more, if only their fates align…

I absolutely loved this book! Not only did I think Minnie and Quinn were fantastic characters, but there were wonderful side characters as well. This story is about much more than Minnie and Quinn’s fated romance. It deals with issues of privilege, identity, aging, family, mental health, and much more. A fantastic book with plenty of depth that will ultimately come through with a big heart-eyes emoji to close out!

About the Book

In this warm-hearted love story for fans of One Day in December, a man and woman who were born at the same hospital on New Year’s Day meet on their thirtieth birthday and discover the many times their paths almost crossed before.

Down-to-earth baker Minnie Cooper knows two things with great certainty: that her New Year’s birthday has always been unlucky, and that it’s all because of Quinn Hamilton, a man she’s never met. Minnie and Quinn were born at the same hospital just after midnight on New Year’s Day thirty years before, and not only did he edge her out by mere minutes to win the cash prize for being the first baby born in London in 1990, but he stole the name she was meant to have, as well. With luck like that, it’s no wonder each of her birthdays has been more of a disaster than the one before.

When Minnie unexpectedly runs into Quinn at a New Year’s party on their mutual thirtieth birthday, she sees only more evidence that fortune has continued to favor him. The handsome, charming business owner truly seems to have it all–including the perfect girlfriend. But if Quinn and Minnie are from different worlds, why do they keep bumping into each other? And why is it that each frustrating interaction somehow seems to leave them both hoping for more?