It Ends with Us by Colleen Hoover Series: It Ends with Us #1
Published by Simon and Schuster on July 28, 2020
Genres: Fiction / Media Tie-In, Fiction / Romance / Contemporary, Fiction / Women
Pages: 448
Format: Audiobook
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In this “brave and heartbreaking novel that digs its claws into you and doesn’t let go, long after you’ve finished it” (Anna Todd, New York Times bestselling author) from the #1 New York Times bestselling author of All Your Perfects, a workaholic with a too-good-to-be-true romance can’t stop thinking about her first love.
Lily hasn’t always had it easy, but that’s never stopped her from working hard for the life she wants. She’s come a long way from the small town where she grew up—she graduated from college, moved to Boston, and started her own business. And when she feels a spark with a gorgeous neurosurgeon named Ryle Kincaid, everything in Lily’s life seems too good to be true.
Ryle is assertive, stubborn, maybe even a little arrogant. He’s also sensitive, brilliant, and has a total soft spot for Lily. And the way he looks in scrubs certainly doesn’t hurt. Lily can’t get him out of her head. But Ryle’s complete aversion to relationships is disturbing. Even as Lily finds herself becoming the exception to his “no dating” rule, she can’t help but wonder what made him that way in the first place.
As questions about her new relationship overwhelm her, so do thoughts of Atlas Corrigan—her first love and a link to the past she left behind. He was her kindred spirit, her protector. When Atlas suddenly reappears, everything Lily has built with Ryle is threatened.
An honest, evocative, and tender novel, It Ends with Us is “a glorious and touching read, a forever keeper. The kind of book that gets handed down” (USA TODAY).
I chose to listen to this novel thanks to The Book Girl’s Guide. And even with a reading hiatus who hasn’t heard of Colleen Hoover? I mean books and movies that make headlines (for all the wrong reasons). I wasn’t sure about reading a romance, but it still captured my attention. I’ve never read her before, and thought with the synopsis and popularity, I’d give it a whirl. And despite all that, I didn’t love it. I really did like it, but there are things that I probably had issues with that the normal reader may not, and some readers may love it more because of those things.
With over 300K reviews (and almost 5 million ratings) on Goodreads and another almost 400K reviews on Storygraph, there’s not much I can share about this book that’s not been put out there over the last decade. I was gripped by the story early on. I was invested in Lily, and I had mixed feelings about Ryle and even Atlas. For a romance, it was really well done, felt organic, and wasn’t so much a formula. But on that romance piece . . . it was a bit too spicy for my taste. I felt like it was gratuitous for just the sake of having a sex scene if I’m being honest. There were times when it was needed for the story, but the rest, honestly, was too much. I think the chemistry could have been built without being quite as graphic as it was, but I also know that fiction is getting spicier and spicier, and well, I’m old and I don’t need that level of joining the bedroom if you will.
Here’s what I did love, however. Hoover tackled a very difficult subject with this book: domestic violence. Generational domestic violence. That’s a hard topic to talk about, much less read about, and I can’t imagine what went into writing about it. I felt like it was extremely well written with all the internal chaos that goes with it. I felt those moments, those reflections, those feelings as I read through the book. I was really transported into Lily’s thoughts as she witnessed and experienced it. Honestly, this rating is 100% related to how well that thread was handled throughout the book, with all partial-star removal all about the unnecessary spice level.
About Colleen Hoover
Colleen Hoover is the #1 New York Times and International bestselling author of twenty five novels and novellas. Hoover’s novels fall into the New Adult and Young Adult contemporary romance categories, as well as psychological thriller.
Colleen Hoover is published by Atria Books, Grand Central Publishing, Montlake Romance, and HarperCollins Publishers.
Colleen is also a scriptwriter, producer, and co-founder of the production company HeartBones Entertainment.
Her novels, It Ends With Us and Regretting You have been adapted into film. It Ends With Us is now available on Netflix, Amazon Prime, YouTube, GooglePlay and AppleTV. Regretting You is available on Paramount +, Amazon Prime, YouTube, GooglePlay and AppleTV.
Colleen’s other titles, Reminders of Him and Verity are headed to the big screen over the next year. Reminders of Him releases March 13, 2026 and Verity in October 2026.
Colleen lives in Texas with her husband and three sons and loves Diet Pepsi.
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