22 Books Like It Ends With Us By Colleen Hoover
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22 Books Like It Ends With Us By Colleen Hoover
If you’re on the hunt for more books like It Ends With Us by Colleen Hoover, this list has got you covered!
It’s no secret that Colleen Hoover has taken over the romance book community by storm with her best-selling novel It Ends With Us.
Not only is it a romance between a quirky yet fiercely independent girl and her neurosurgeon boyfriend, it also sheds light on deeper topics such as DA in relationships.
This list not only features other notable Colleen Hoover books, but also books similar to It Ends With Us by way of heart-wrenching storylines and whirlwind romances that you will be sure to love!
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Hey! Don’t forget to also checkout 35 Best Quotes From It Ends With Us!
Quick Reading Tip: If you want to read more books this year or if you find it difficult to read non-fiction/self help books.
Listening to an audiobook really helps! Having someone narrate to you will help you read and absorb information faster.
Receive 2 audiobook credits with my code: BREWING on Libro.fm! Support local bookstores. Cancel anytime and keep your audiobooks and credits! Don’t like an audiobook? FREE RETURNS!
22 Books Like It Ends With Us By Colleen Hoover
1. It Starts With Us by Colleen Hoover
Summary: Before It Ends with Us, it started with Atlas. Colleen Hoover tells fan favorite Atlas’ side of the story and shares what comes next in this long-anticipated sequel to the “glorious and touching” (USA TODAY) #1 New York Times bestseller It Ends with Us.
Genre: Romance, Contemporary
Goodreads Rating: 4.81
What Are Readers Saying?
I couldn’t start this list without mentioning the SEQUEL to ‘It Ends With Us’, which is a retelling of the first story, but this time, through Atlas’ eyes.
If, like me, you couldn’t get enough of Lily and Atlas’ relationship in the first book, It Starts With Us will definitely provide a deeper dimension to their story by providing another perspective that we haven’t seen before.
Although this book has yet to be released, with all the anticipation and excitement surrounding it online, this definitely deserves to be top of the list of best books like It Ends With Us!
Purchase: Book Depository | Amazon | Libro.fm
2. Love and Other Words by Christina Lauren
Summary: The story of the heart can never be unwritten.
Macy Sorensen is settling into an ambitious if emotionally tepid routine: work hard as a new pediatrics resident, plan her wedding to an older, financially secure man, keep her head down and heart tucked away.
But when she runs into Elliot Petropoulos—the first and only love of her life—the careful bubble she’s constructed begins to dissolve. Once upon a time, Elliot was Macy’s entire world—growing from her gangly bookish friend into the man who coaxed her heart open again after the loss of her mother…only to break it on the very night he declared his love for her.
Told in alternating timelines between Then and Now, teenage Elliot and Macy grow from friends to much more—spending weekends and lazy summers together in a house outside of San Francisco devouring books, sharing favorite words, and talking through their growing pains and triumphs. As adults, they have become strangers to one another until their chance reunion. Although their memories are obscured by the agony of what happened that night so many years ago, Elliot will come to understand the truth behind Macy’s decade-long silence, and will have to overcome the past and himself to revive her faith in the possibility of an all-consuming love.
Genre: Contemporary, Romance
Goodreads Rating: 4.34
What Are Readers Saying?
This is a story of two high school sweethearts whose love blossoms over their love of books (too adorable!) but over time their lives diverge and they grow apart.
The story alternates between the past and the present, giving multiple dimensions to the story to allow us to uncover exactly what happened to lead their love astray.
This is definitely a book to read if you liked reading It Ends With Us as there are many parallels that can be drawn between Elliot and Macy’s relationship and Lily and Atlas’.
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3. Queenie by Candice Carty-Williams
Summary: Queenie Jenkins is a 25-year-old Jamaican British woman living in London, straddling two cultures and slotting neatly into neither. She works at a national newspaper, where she’s constantly forced to compare herself to her white middle class peers. After a messy break up from her long-term white boyfriend, Queenie seeks comfort in all the wrong places…including several hazardous men who do a good job of occupying brain space and a bad job of affirming self-worth.
As Queenie careens from one questionable decision to another, she finds herself wondering, “What are you doing? Why are you doing it? Who do you want to be?”—all of the questions today’s woman must face in a world trying to answer them for her.
Genre: Contemporary, Feminist, Chick-Lit
Goodreads Rating: 3.88
What Are Readers Saying?
This is a powerful read that touches on topics of race, coming-of-age in our twenties (probably the most turbulent times of our lives!), and the relationships we engage in.
After her break-up with her white boyfriend, she is left unstable and insecure in other areas of her life.
Overall, Queenie is a heartwarming read about a woman trying to navigate through her work and personal relationship with the help of her friends and family, which is a theme that runs quite closely in parallel to It Ends With Us.
If you liked this aspect of Colleen Hoover’s book, you’ll definitely enjoy Queenie!
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4. The People We Keep by Allison Larkin
Summary: Little River, New York, 1994: April Sawicki is living in a motorless motorhome that her father won in a poker game. Failing out of school, picking up shifts at Margo’s diner, she’s left fending for herself in a town where she’s never quite felt at home. When she “borrows” her neighbor’s car to perform at an open mic night, she realizes her life could be much bigger than where she came from. After a fight with her dad, April packs her stuff and leaves for good, setting off on a journey to find a life that’s all hers.
As April moves through the world, meeting people who feel like home, she chronicles her life in the songs she writes and discovers that where she came from doesn’t dictate who she has to be.
This lyrical, unflinching tale is for anyone who has ever yearned for the fierce power of a found family or to grasp the profound beauty of choosing to belong.
Genre: Historical Fiction, Contemporary
Goodreads Rating: 4.20
What Are Readers Saying?
Another one to add to the list of books like It Ends With Us is Allison Larkin’s The People We Keep. Just like It Ends With Us, this is a story that centers around abuse.
After finally finding the courage to leave her home and toxic father, April finds her way to Ithaca, where the people she meets will help her to piece her life back together and heal.
This is a heartwarming and poignant read with similar themes to It Ends With us that I’m sure you’ll love!
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5. In Five Years by Rebecca Serle
Summary: Where do you see yourself in five years?
When Type-A Manhattan lawyer Dannie Kohan is asked this question at the most important interview of her career, she has a meticulously crafted answer at the ready. Later, after nailing her interview and accepting her boyfriend’s marriage proposal, Dannie goes to sleep knowing she is right on track to achieve her five-year plan.
But when she wakes up, she’s suddenly in a different apartment, with a different ring on her finger, and beside a very different man. The television news is on in the background, and she can just make out the scrolling date. It’s the same night—December 15—but 2025, five years in the future.
After a very intense, shocking hour, Dannie wakes again, at the brink of midnight, back in 2020. She can’t shake what has happened. It certainly felt much more than merely a dream, but she isn’t the kind of person who believes in visions. That nonsense is only charming coming from free-spirited types, like her lifelong best friend, Bella. Determined to ignore the odd experience, she files it away in the back of her mind.
That is, until four-and-a-half years later, when by chance Dannie meets the very same man from her long-ago vision.
Brimming with joy and heartbreak, In Five Years is an unforgettable love story that reminds us of the power of loyalty, friendship, and the unpredictable nature of destiny.
Genre: Contemporary, Romance
Goodreads Rating: 3.82
What Are Readers Saying?
What if you suddenly woke up five years later and your life as you know it was not as you had planned? For just one hour, Dannie wakes up in her future – in a new apartment, wearing a different ring, next to a different man to whom she was engaged to five years earlier.
This is a story about the unexpected ways in which our lives unfold. A reflective, and sob-inducing read, it’ll definitely have you feeling just as emotional as It Ends With Us.
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6. When We Were Infinite by Kelly Loy Gilbert
Summary: All Beth wants is for her tight-knit circle of friends — Grace Nakamura, Brandon Lin, Sunny Chen, and Jason Tsou — to stay together. With her family splintered and her future a question mark, these friends are all she has — even if she sometimes wonders if she truly fits in with them. Besides, she’s certain she’ll never be able to tell Jason how she really feels about him, so friendship will have to be enough.
Then Beth witnesses a private act of violence in Jason’s home, and the whole group is shaken. Beth and her friends make a pact to do whatever it takes to protect Jason, no matter the sacrifice. But when even their fierce loyalty isn’t enough to stop Jason from making a life-altering choice, Beth must decide how far she’s willing to go for him—and how much of herself she’s willing to give up.
From award-winning author Kelly Loy Gilbert comes a powerful, achingly romantic drama about the secrets we keep, from each other and from ourselves, perfect for fans of Permanent Record and I Am Not Your Perfect Mexican Daughter.
Genre: Young Adult, Contemporary, Romance
Goodreads Rating: 3.81
What Are Readers Saying?
Beth, a high school student, is surrounded by an incredible group of friends who cherish and support her despite her less than ideal family situation.
When her friend Jason experiences violence at home, this darkens the last few years of their high school lives.
This is a book like It Ends With Us in how it relates to violence in the home, but also in the way it celebrates friendships in light of hard times.
If you loved Allysa and Lily’s dynamic in It Ends With Us, you’ll be sure to find enjoyment in When We Were Infinite!
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7. Wish You Were Here by Renee Carlino
Summary: Charlotte has spent her twenties adrift, floating from interest to interest, job to job, and guy to guy, searching for a spark but never quite finding it. All she knows is that she won’t discover it working as a waitress at a pies-and-fries joint in Los Angeles or living with her fun but aimless best friend in a tiny apartment in the Arts District.
Then Charlotte collides with Adam, a gorgeous and soulful painter who seems just as lost as she feels. Their instant connection turns into a midnight drink… and a whirlwind night of champagne, Chinese food, and the kind of conversation that only happens in romantic comedies. But the next morning, Adam gives Charlotte the cold shoulder, leaving her confused and hurt—and wondering if the few odd moments between them the night before were red flags in disguise.
Months later, Charlotte hasn’t been able to shake Adam, so she decides to find out what happened the morning after their magical night together. This fateful decision rewrites their wild love story, but what Charlotte doesn’t know yet is that the ending has already been written.
Genre: Romance, Contemporary
Goodreads Rating: 3.98
What Are Readers Saying?
Charlotte meets Adam and the connection is instant and deep. They have one blissful night together, but to her dismay, he suddenly flips a switch and becomes disagreeable and detached.
Further down the line, Charlotte meets Seth through the insistence of her best friend.
However, Charlotte can’t help but wonder where Adam is now and what happened that night they were together that led to his change in behavior.
This is a beautiful yet devastating read about a woman caught between two lovers and, thus, two destinies.
It definitely draws some parallels to Lily’s decision between Ryle and Atlas in It Ends With Us!
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8. Reminders of Him by Colleen Hoover
Summary: A troubled young mother yearns for a shot at redemption in this heartbreaking yet hopeful story from #1 New York Times bestselling author Colleen Hoover.
After serving five years in prison for a tragic mistake, Kenna Rowan returns to the town where it all went wrong, hoping to reunite with her four-year-old daughter. But the bridges Kenna burned are proving impossible to rebuild. Everyone in her daughter’s life is determined to shut Kenna out, no matter how hard she works to prove herself.
The only person who hasn’t closed the door on her completely is Ledger Ward, a local bar owner and one of the few remaining links to Kenna’s daughter. But if anyone were to discover how Ledger is slowly becoming an important part of Kenna’s life, both would risk losing the trust of everyone important to them.
The two form a connection despite the pressure surrounding them, but as their romance grows, so does the risk. Kenna must find a way to absolve the mistakes of her past in order to build a future out of hope and healing.
Genre: Contemporary, Romance
Goodreads Rating: 4.57
What Are Readers Saying?
Other than the critically acclaimed It Ends With Us, Reminders of Him is one of Colleen Hoover’s newest standalones.
This is a story of a woman who has just been released from prison and is trying to re-assimilate back into her old life.
She struggles with employment, affording rent, and everyday things that those who haven’t been in her position don’t really need to consider as much.
She meets Ledger Ward, who accepts her as she is, flawed past and all, despite the rejection from everyone else in her life.
Their romance is a risky one and Kenna must find a way to deal with her past whilst building the future that she wants with Ledger and her daughter.
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9. Beautiful World Where Are You by Sally Rooney
Summary: Alice, a novelist, meets Felix, who works in a warehouse, and asks him if he’d like to travel to Rome with her. In Dublin, her best friend, Eileen, is getting over a break-up and slips back into flirting with Simon, a man she has known since childhood. Alice, Felix, Eileen, and Simon are still young—but life is catching up with them. They desire each other, they delude each other, they get together, they break apart. Are they standing in the last lighted room before the darkness, bearing witness to something? Will they find a way to believe in a beautiful world?
Genre: Contemporary, Romance
Goodreads Rating: 3.63
What Are Readers Saying?
Beautiful World Where Are You is Sally Rooney’s third and most anticipated novel. Just like Rooney’s previous works, Beautiful World adopts her “no plot, just vibes” style that is the hallmark of Rooney’s writing.
This is a book similar to It Ends With Us in that it explores complicated adult friendships that turn into relationships.
The dynamic between Eileen and Simon, and that of Alice and Felix, draws parallels with Lily and Atlas’ in It Ends With Us.
Sally Rooney, just like Colleen Hoover, has taken the book community by storm, and chances are, if you like one author, you’ll definitely want to check out the other!
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10. One True Loves by Taylor Jenkins Reid
Summary: In her twenties, Emma Blair marries her high school sweetheart, Jesse. They build a life for themselves, far away from the expectations of their parents and the people of their hometown in Massachusetts. They travel the world together, living life to the fullest and seizing every opportunity for adventure.
On their first wedding anniversary, Jesse is on a helicopter over the Pacific when it goes missing. Just like that, Jesse is gone forever.
Emma quits her job and moves home in an effort to put her life back together. Years later, now in her thirties, Emma runs into an old friend, Sam, and finds herself falling in love again. When Emma and Sam get engaged, it feels like Emma’s second chance at happiness.
That is, until Jesse is found. He’s alive, and he’s been trying all these years to come home to her. With a husband and a fiancé, Emma has to now figure out who she is and what she wants, while trying to protect the ones she loves.
Who is her one true love? What does it mean to love truly? Emma knows she has to listen to her heart. She’s just not sure what it’s saying.
Genre: Contemporary, Romance
Goodreads Rating: 4.07
What Are Readers Saying?
This is a gripping and soul-crushing love story about a woman who has to choose between a husband that she lost years earlier to a helicopter ride gone wrong and a new man that she is now engaged to in the present.
It is similar to It Ends With Us in how it portrays the female protagonist as having to make a difficult, life-altering decision between the two people that mean the most to her.
If you want to relive the heart-wrenching prose of It Ends With Us, One True Loves by Taylor Jenkins Reid is definitely one to put on the TBR list!
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11. Remembrance by Jude Deveraux
Summary: Bestselling romance writer Hayden Lane has found her soulmate – or rather, created him: he’s her latest fictional hero. And she’s totally obsessed with him. Barely noticing when her real-life fiance breaks their engagement, she visits a psychic to learn more about him – and is told that in a past life Hayden was Lady de Grey, a promiscuous woman of Edwardian England. Hayden can’t resist submitting to a hypnotist’s magic. But the trick goes wrong, and instead of merely remembering her past as Lady de Grey, Hayden is living it. Now she will discover quite a different story about a woman history considered a trollop, a spectacular, brooding man, and the rapturous love that would be hers if she dared open her heart to the most mysterious adventure of all.
Genre: Science Fiction, Romance
Goodreads Rating: 4.01
What Are Readers Saying?
Remembrance by Jude Deveraux is a science fiction romance about a woman who loses touch with reality by becoming obsessed with a fictional character she’s created.
After her fiance leaves her, she finds herself amidst a psychic who tells her she won’t be happy with her current life because of what happened in her previous lives.
With that, Hayden is transported back into the past and experiences several of her past loves.
Just like It Ends With Us, this is a story that explores parallel lives and addresses the “what ifs” and “what could have beens”.
For fans of It Ends With Us, you’ll be sure to love this book!
Purchase: Book Depository | Amazon
Quick Reading Tip: If you want to read more books this year or if you find it difficult to read non-fiction/self help books.
Listening to an audiobook really helps! Having someone narrate to you will help you read and absorb information faster.
Receive 2 audiobook credits with my code: BREWING on Libro.fm! Support local bookstores. Cancel anytime and keep your audiobooks and credits! Don’t like an audiobook? FREE RETURNS!
12. Seven Days in June by Tia Williams
Summary: Brooklynite Eva Mercy is a single mom and bestselling erotica writer, who is feeling pressed from all sides. Shane Hall is a reclusive, enigmatic, award-winning literary author who, to everyone’s surprise, shows up in New York.
When Shane and Eva meet unexpectedly at a literary event, sparks fly, raising not only their past buried traumas, but the eyebrows of New York’s Black literati. What no one knows is that twenty years earlier, teenage Eva and Shane spent one crazy, torrid week madly in love. They may be pretending that everything is fine now, but they can’t deny their chemistry – or the fact that they’ve been secretly writing to each other in their books ever since.
Over the next seven days in the middle of a steamy Brooklyn summer, Eva and Shane reconnect, but Eva’s not sure how she can trust the man who broke her heart, and she needs to get him out of New York so that her life can return to normal. But before Shane disappears again, there are a few questions she needs answered…
With its keen observations of Black life and the condition of modern motherhood, as well as the consequences of motherless-ness, Seven Days in June is by turns humorous and warm.
Genre: Contemporary, Romance
Goodreads Rating: 4.10
What Are Readers Saying?
Shane and Eva first meet as teenagers, where they spend one whirlwind of a week together madly in love.
Twenty years later, they will bump into each other again at a literary event as authors in their current lives.
The book spans just seven days where Shane and Eva will reconnect to find out whether their long-lost spark can be re-ignited again, or whether their romance from the past has well and truly fizzled out with age and time.
For fans of Lily and Atlas’ life-long friendship/romance dynamic, you’ll be sure to love Seven Days in June!
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13. Call Me by Your Name by André Aciman
Summary: Call Me by Your Name is the story of a sudden and powerful romance that blossoms between an adolescent boy and a summer guest at his parents’ cliff-side mansion on the Italian Riviera. Unprepared for the consequences of their attraction, at first each feigns indifference. But during the restless summer weeks that follow, unrelenting buried currents of obsession and fear, fascination and desire, intensify their passion as they test the charged ground between them. What grows from the depths of their spirits is a romance of scarcely six weeks’ duration and an experience that marks them for a lifetime. For what the two discover on the Riviera and during a sultry evening in Rome is the one thing both already fear they may never truly find again: total intimacy.
The psychological maneuvers that accompany attraction have seldom been more shrewdly captured than in André Aciman’s frank, unsentimental, heartrending elegy to human passion. Call Me by Your Name is clear-eyed, bare-knuckled, and ultimately unforgettable.
Genre: Contemporary, Romance, LGBTQ
Goodreads Rating: 4.15
What Are Readers Saying?
Just like Colleen Hoover’s It Ends With Us, Call Me By Your Name is about fleeting relationships that reverberate through a lifetime.
A young teenager spends summer with a guest at his father’s mansion. For the first time in his life, he knows what it means to fall in love. This story parallels Lily first falling in love with Atlas in her formative years.
Call Me By Your Name is a heartbreaking and exploratory read on young love that you’ll want to ready your box of tissues for!
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14. They Both Die at the End by Adam Silvera
Summary: Adam Silvera reminds us that there’s no life without death and no love without loss in this devastating yet uplifting story about two people whose lives change over the course of one unforgettable day.
On September 5, a little after midnight, Death-Cast calls Mateo Torrez and Rufus Emeterio to give them some bad news: They’re going to die today.
Mateo and Rufus are total strangers, but, for different reasons, they’re both looking to make a new friend on their End Day. The good news: There’s an app for that. It’s called the Last Friend, and through it, Rufus and Mateo are about to meet up for one last great adventure—to live a lifetime in a single day.
Genre: Contemporary, Romance, LGBTQ
Goodreads Rating: 3.89
What Are Readers Saying?
Two boys find out through Death-Cast that they will die on that same day.
It is through the ‘Last Friend’ app (which allows people who receive the death-cast call to meet) that Mateo and Rufus find each other.
This is a heartfelt and charming novel about a burgeoning friendship, full of adventure and love.
The storyline is so absorbing to the point where you forget that they’re both on their End Day, which will leave you all the more devastated by the end.
This is a gut-punch of a book to read if you liked reading it ends with us!
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15. Where the Crawdad Sing by Delia Owens
Summary: For years, rumors of the “Marsh Girl” haunted Barkley Cove, a quiet fishing village. Kya Clark is barefoot and wild; unfit for polite society. So in late 1969, when the popular Chase Andrews is found dead, locals immediately suspect her.
But Kya is not what they say. A born naturalist with just one day of school, she takes life’s lessons from the land, learning the real ways of the world from the dishonest signals of fireflies. But while she has the skills to live in solitude forever, the time comes when she yearns to be touched and loved. Drawn to two young men from town, who are each intrigued by her wild beauty, Kya opens herself to a new and startling world—until the unthinkable happens.
In Where the Crawdads Sing, Owens juxtaposes an exquisite ode to the natural world against a profound coming of age story and haunting mystery. Thought-provoking, wise, and deeply moving, Owens’s debut novel reminds us that we are forever shaped by the child within us, while also subject to the beautiful and violent secrets that nature keeps.
The story asks how isolation influences the behavior of a young woman, who like all of us, has the genetic propensity to belong to a group. The clues to the mystery are brushed into the lush habitat and natural histories of its wild creatures.
Genre: Historical Fiction, Mystery, Contemporary
Goodreads Rating: 4.46
What Are Readers Saying?
Just like It Ends With Us, Where The Crawdads Sing has certainly garnered its fair share of fame amongst the book community!
This is a story about a young woman’s isolation in nature. She has been accused of murder, and has retreated into the wild to live out her days.
One day, however, she comes across two men from town whom she is immediately drawn to, and will change her life in irrevocable ways.
This is a thrilling murder mystery that also touched on themes of loneliness and love that will leave readers reflecting on many of life’s important questions.
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16. The Stationery Shop of Tehran by Marjan Kamali
Summary: A poignant, heartfelt new novel by the award-nominated author of Together Tea—extolled by the Wall Street Journal as a “moving tale of lost love” and by Shelf Awareness as “a powerful, heartbreaking story”—explores loss, reconciliation, and the quirks of fate.
Roya, a dreamy, idealistic teenager living amid the political upheaval of 1953 Tehran, finds a literary oasis in kindly Mr. Fakhri’s neighborhood stationery shop, stocked with books and pens and bottles of jewel-colored ink.
Then Mr. Fakhri, with a keen instinct for a budding romance, introduces Roya to his other favorite customer—handsome Bahman, who has a burning passion for justice and a love for Rumi’s poetry—and she loses her heart at once. Their romance blossoms, and the little stationery shop remains their favorite place in all of Tehran.
A few short months later, on the eve of their marriage, Roya agrees to meet Bahman at the town square when violence erupts—a result of the coup d’etat that forever changes their country’s future. In the chaos, Bahman never shows. For weeks, Roya tries desperately to contact him, but her efforts are fruitless. With a sorrowful heart, she moves on—to college in California, to another man, to a life in New England—until, more than sixty years later, an accident of fate leads her back to Bahman and offers her a chance to ask him the questions that have haunted her for more than half a century: Why did you leave? Where did you go? How is it that you were able to forget me?
Genre: Historical Fiction, Romance
Goodreads Rating: 4.21
What Are Readers Saying?
Set in the 50s against the backdrop of Iran’s political turmoil, the meeting of two teenagers in a stationery shop blossoms into a once-in-a-lifetime love.
Just before they are to be married, a coup d’etat separates the lovers. Sixty years will pass before the lovers are reunited again by chance.
Similarly to It Ends With Us, this is a heart wrenching tale of being haunted by a past lover, and navigating through life always pondering what could have been.
A beautiful story with a heartfelt core, The Stationary Shop of Tehran definitely deserves to be on this list of books like It Ends With Us.
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17. Me before You by Jojo Moyes
Summary: They had nothing in common until love gave them everything to lose.
Louisa Clark is an ordinary girl living an exceedingly ordinary life—steady boyfriend, close family—who has barely been farther afield than their tiny village. She takes a badly needed job working for ex–Master of the Universe Will Traynor, who is wheelchair bound after an accident. Will has always lived a huge life—big deals, extreme sports, worldwide travel—and now he’s pretty sure he cannot live the way he is.
Will is acerbic, moody, bossy—but Lou refuses to treat him with kid gloves, and soon his happiness means more to her than she expected. When she learns that Will has shocking plans of his own, she sets out to show him that life is still worth living.
A Love Story for this generation and perfect for fans of John Green’s The Fault in Our Stars, Me Before You brings to life two people who couldn’t have less in common—a heartbreakingly romantic novel that asks, What do you do when making the person you love happy also means breaking your own heart?
Genre: Contemporary, Romance
Goodreads Rating: 4.26
What Are Readers Saying?
I couldn’t blog about Colleen Hoover’s book without also mentioning one of the most famous romance novels/movies of our generation!
Me Before You is about a love that is so perfect yet impossible to continue.
When two people want so badly to be with each other but ultimately know that they can’t or shouldn’t be.
This is probably one of the most painful types of romance storylines out there, and Me Before You executes it so beautifully.
If you’re looking for a gut-punch read that will leave you reaching for the tissues time and time again, you’ll love Me Before You!
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18. The Fault in Our Stars by John Green
Summary: Despite the tumor-shrinking medical miracle that has bought her a few years, Hazel has never been anything but terminal, her final chapter inscribed upon diagnosis. But when a gorgeous plot twist named Augustus Waters suddenly appears at Cancer Kid Support Group, Hazel’s story is about to be completely rewritten.
Insightful, bold, irreverent, and raw, The Fault in Our Stars is award-winning author John Green’s most ambitious and heartbreaking work yet, brilliantly exploring the funny, thrilling, and tragic business of being alive and in love.
Genre: Young Adult, Romance
Goodreads Rating: 4.16
What Are Readers Saying?
The Fault in Our Stars is a poignant and heartbreaking story about young love, friendship and loss.
Hazel Grace and Augustus Waters meet at a cancer support group and fall in love.
Their love is laced with the threat of death, but regardless they must find ways to live out their youth and sustain the health of their romance in any way they can.
There’s a beautiful sense of hope and adventure throughout this book, which makes the ending all the more heartbreaking.
As far as tear jerkers go, this book is pretty a good one to pick up, especially for fans of It Ends With Us.
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19. The Time Traveler’s Wife by Audrey Niffenegger
Summary: A funny, often poignant tale of boy meets girl with a twist: what if one of them couldn’t stop slipping in and out of time? Highly original and imaginative, this debut novel raises questions about life, love, and the effects of time on relationships.
Audrey Niffenegger’s innovative debut, The Time Traveler’s Wife, is the story of Clare, a beautiful art student, and Henry, an adventuresome librarian, who have known each other since Clare was six and Henry was thirty-six, and were married when Clare was twenty-three and Henry thirty-one. Impossible but true, because Henry is one of the first people diagnosed with Chrono-Displacement Disorder: periodically his genetic clock resets and he finds himself misplaced in time, pulled to moments of emotional gravity in his life, past and future. His disappearances are spontaneous, his experiences unpredictable, alternately harrowing and amusing.
The Time Traveler’s Wife depicts the effects of time travel on Henry and Clare’s marriage and their passionate love for each other as the story unfolds from both points of view. Clare and Henry attempt to live normal lives, pursuing familiar goals—steady jobs, good friends, children of their own. All of this is threatened by something they can neither prevent nor control, making their story intensely moving and entirely unforgettable.
Genre: Science Fiction, Romance, Fantasy
Goodreads Rating: 3.99
What Are Readers Saying?
Just like It Ends With Us, The Time Traveler’s Wife is a romance that is plagued by the powers of time.
Henry has Chrono-Displacement Disorder, which means that he will often be misplaced in time.
This is beyond his control and it results in at times humorous, but also harrowing turns of events in his romance with Clare.
This is a unique romance with a science-fiction twist, replete with heartwarming, tender, and devastating moments. Definitely a refreshing read amongst the romance novel genre!
Purchase: Book Depository | Amazon | Libro fm
20. The Great Alone by Kristin Hannah
Summary: Alaska, 1974.
Unpredictable. Unforgiving. Untamed.
For a family in crisis, the ultimate test of survival.
Ernt Allbright, a former POW, comes home from the Vietnam war a changed and volatile man. When he loses yet another job, he makes an impulsive decision: he will move his family north, to Alaska, where they will live off the grid in America’s last true frontier.
Thirteen-year-old Leni, a girl coming of age in a tumultuous time, caught in the riptide of her parents’ passionate, stormy relationship, dares to hope that a new land will lead to a better future for her family. She is desperate for a place to belong. Her mother, Cora, will do anything and go anywhere for the man she loves, even if it means following him into the unknown.
At first, Alaska seems to be the answer to their prayers. In a wild, remote corner of the state, they find a fiercely independent community of strong men and even stronger women. The long, sunlit days and the generosity of the locals make up for the Allbrights’ lack of preparation and dwindling resources.
But as winter approaches and darkness descends on Alaska, Ernt’s fragile mental state deteriorates and the family begins to fracture. Soon the perils outside pale in comparison to threats from within. In their small cabin, covered in snow, blanketed in eighteen hours of night, Leni and her mother learn the terrible truth: they are on their own. In the wild, there is no one to save them but themselves.
In this unforgettable portrait of human frailty and resilience, Kristin Hannah reveals the indomitable character of the modern American pioneer and the spirit of a vanishing Alaska―a place of incomparable beauty and danger. The Great Alone is a daring, beautiful, stay-up-all-night story about love and loss, the fight for survival, and the wildness that lives in both man and nature.
Genre: Historical Fiction, Romance
Goodreads Rating: 4.37
What Are Readers Saying?
The Great Alone is a historical fiction romance novel about a man, tortured by his past as a POW in the Vietnam war, who relocates his family to a secluded, off-the-grid location in Alaska.
It is in this wilderness, but also against her father’s demons, that Leni and her mother must survive.
This is a story about trauma and the impact it has on love and family. In this sense, it is a book like It Ends With Us with how it touches on these sensitive themes.
Purchase: Book Depository | Amazon | Librofm
21. Safe Haven by Nicholas Sparks
Summary: When a mysterious young woman named Katie appears in the small North Carolina town of Southport, her sudden arrival raises questions about her past. Beautiful yet self-effacing, Katie seems determined to avoid forming personal ties until a series of events draws her into two reluctant relationships: one with Alex, a widowed store owner with a kind heart and two young children; and another with her plainspoken single neighbor, Jo. Despite her reservations, Katie slowly begins to let down her guard, putting down roots in the close-knit community and becoming increasingly attached to Alex and his family.
But even as Katie begins to fall in love, she struggles with the dark secret that still haunts and terrifies her . . . a past that set her on a fearful, shattering journey across the country, to the sheltered oasis of Southport. With Jo’s empathic and stubborn support, Katie eventually realizes that she must choose between a life of transient safety and one of riskier rewards . . . and that in the darkest hour, love is the only true safe haven.
Genre: Contemporary, Romance
Goodreads Rating: 4.21
What Are Readers Saying?
Safe Haven draws parallels with It Ends With Us in that it touches on the theme of domestic violence.
It is a plot that centers around a relationship punctuated by moments akin to a thriller, making it a riveting yet poignant read.
Katie, the protagonist, finds love again with Alex after leaving her toxic relationship.
She must then find the courage to become vulnerable again and to give love another chance.
Nicholas Sparks is definitely a go-to romance author for many in the bookish community, and Safe Haven is one of the best books in his collection that you won’t want to miss out on!
Purchase: Book Depository | Amazon
22. Ugly Love by Colleen Hoover
Summary: When Tate Collins meets airline pilot Miles Archer, she knows it isn’t love at first sight. They wouldn’t even go so far as to consider themselves friends. The only thing Tate and Miles have in common is an undeniable mutual attraction. Once their desires are out in the open, they realize they have the perfect set-up. Their arrangement could be surprisingly seamless, as long as Tate can stick to the only two rules Miles has for her.
Never ask about the past.
Don’t expect a future.
They think they can handle it, but realize almost immediately they can’t handle it at all.
Hearts get infiltrated.
Promises get broken.
Rules get shattered.
Love gets ugly.
Genre: Contemporary, Romance
Goodreads Rating: 4.25
What Are Readers Saying?
Ugly Love, hailed as one of the best Colleen Hoover books in her collection, is definitely one to look out for if you couldn’t get enough of her storytelling from It Ends With Us.
Tate and Miles embark on a purely sexual relationship that is predicated on two rules: (1) to never ask about the past, and (2) to not expect a future together.
However, with every friends-with-benefits arrangement, there will always be that lurking risk of catching feelings.
This time-bomb of a relationship will keep you on your toes and will have you devouring this book in days.
This is also CoHo’s spiciest book, if that’s your thing, do check it out!
Purchase: Book Depository | Amazon | Libro fm
I hope you enjoyed this list of books like It Ends With Us, and that you’ll find your next great read amongst these amazing titles!
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