It Starts with Us (2022)
It Starts with Us is a 2022 contemporary book written by Colleen Hoover.
Lily Bloom has found a workable peace, coparenting her daughter with her ex-husband Ryle, when Atlas Corrigan walks back into her life. The two were each other's first love years ago, and this time nothing stands between them except Ryle, who has no intention of watching his ex-wife fall for the one man he cannot stand. Colleen Hoover's 2022 sequel to It Ends with Us splits its chapters between Lily and Atlas, filling in his guarded past while she reaches for a second chance at the love she once lost. It became Simon & Schuster's most pre-ordered book ever.
Quick answers
What is It Starts with Us about?
Lily Bloom has found a workable peace, coparenting her daughter with her ex-husband Ryle, when Atlas Corrigan walks back into her life. The two were each other's first love years ago, and this time nothing stands between them except Ryle, who has no intention of watching his ex-wife fall for the one man he cannot stand. Colleen Hoover's 2022 sequel to It Ends with Us splits its chapters between Lily and Atlas, filling in his guarded past while she reaches for a second chance at the love she once lost. It became Simon & Schuster's most pre-ordered book ever.
When was It Starts with Us published?
It Starts with Us was published in 2022.
Who made It Starts with Us?
It Starts with Us was written by Colleen Hoover.
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A few thoughts on It Starts with Us
Readers here want emotional, high-stakes romance. The film It Ends with Us adapts the first book and its central couple, so it is the obvious next stop. For more turbulent second-chance heartbreak on screen, After We Fell hits the same swoony register, and Taylor Swift's 1989 makes a fitting soundtrack for Lily and Atlas.
Old flames who find their way back to each other
It Starts with Us reunites Lily with the first person she ever loved, years and a marriage later, with her ex-husband still very much in the picture. The Notebook, The Time Traveler's Wife, It Ends with Us, After We Fell and Every Year After all return to that same ache, two people who never fully let go of each other, pulled back together across years of distance.
Starting over when your old life stops fitting
Lily spends It Starts with Us rebuilding her own life on her own terms, coparenting her daughter while she figures out who she wants to become next, with her ex-husband still nearby. Stardew Valley, To the Moon, Life is Strange: True Colors and The Sims 4 all hand players that same blank slate, while Outlander's Claire builds an entire second life for herself once the one she knew is gone.
Slow-burn romance manga where the feelings sneak up on you
Lily and Atlas spend It Starts with Us circling a feeling neither of them is ready to name out loud, testing it in small gestures before anything is said outright. Hana-Kimi, Teasing Master Takagi-san, Nodame Cantabile, True Beauty and Kiss Him Not Me all build their romance the same patient way, through teasing, near-misses and the slow realization that a friend has become something more.