See You Yesterday by Rachel Lynn Solomon

See You Yesterday by Rachel Lynn Solomon
Narrator: Emily Lawrence
Published by Simon Schuster Books for Young Readers
Published on 17 May 2022
Genres: Adolescence, Contemporary, Love & Romance, Romance, United States, Young Adult
Pages: 419
Format: Audiobook
Source: my local library
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RRP: $22.99

Barrett Bloom is hoping college will be a fresh start after a messy high school experience. But when school begins on September 21st, everything goes wrong. She’s humiliated by the know-it-all in her physics class, she botches her interview for the college paper, and at a party that night, she accidentally sets a frat on fire. She panics and flees, and when she realizes her roommate locked her out of their dorm, she falls asleep in the common room.
The next morning, Barrett’s perplexed to find herself back in her dorm room bed, no longer smelling of ashes and crushed dreams. It’s September 21st. Again. And after a confrontation with Miles, the guy from Physics 101, she learns she’s not alone—he’s been trapped for months.
When her attempts to fix her timeline fail, she agrees to work with Miles to find a way out. Soon they’re exploring the mysterious underbelly of the university and going on wild, romantic adventures. As they start falling for each other, they face the universe’s biggest unanswered question yet: what happens to their relationship if they finally make it to tomorrow?

I really enjoyed this book – I listened to it on audio – and it was highly engaging and entertaining for a large part of the narrative.

I thoroughly enjoy time loop stories, and I was delighted to see common elements explored in this novel such as the ‘no consequences’ day and several other elements I can’t mention for spoiling. I also really enjoyed how the scientific aspects and plausibility of the time loop was explored quite thoroughly. I think trying to keep this as spoiler-free as possible is in the best interests of other readers, but there was a lot I enjoyed in this book as part of the time loop narrative, however when I got to about 80% of the book it did feel like it was beginning to drag. I know it’s repetitive due to being a time loop story, but there was some places where there was no character or plot growth for quite some time, which made the repetitive days seem lacklustre and unengaging. Sometimes the character did nothing which yes, is realistic, but no, does not make for engaging content.

I definitely recognise how much work the author put into the characterisation, with so many tiny details imparted about both characters to make them seem thoroughly well-rounded a realistic, and also to demonstrate the phenomenal character growth shown by both characters over the course of the story. The supporting characters were all similarly deep, and I felt thoroughly immersed in the world. While I did say above that the novel did really start to slow down in the latter half of the book, the characterisation never did. Despite this being a high concept novel, the focus really was on the characterisation and connection between Barret and Miles.

However, I never really felt that the main pair were particularly at odds with each other. They didn’t really fight, although they did refer to arguments, and Solomon was trying to paint it as more of a reluctant kind of developing relationship. But I never got the impression that the two couldn’t stand each other and oh no they just HAPPEN to be trapped. Sure, Barret was abrasive about 5% of the time, and Miles was reluctant to show emotions for a really (frustratingly) long time, but it never really felt like the borderline enemies-to-lovers to reluctant allies I think Solomon was aiming for. I never really got the impression that Barrett disliked Miles at all, and vice versa, though I did very thoroughly enjoy watching Barret go from annoyed to affectionate to falling in love and pining in one of the most heartfelt pines I think I’ve ever read. Similarly, even though the novel was all from Barrett’s POV, we as readers could tell that Miles was developing insanely strong feelings for her as well, even though she, as the character, seemed unaware for most of it. It really was ridiculously adorable to read and very well done by Solomon.

I would recommend this book as a fantastic example of showing a very clear developing relationship that is in no way instalove, and develops at a slower burn. I personally especially love when the main character picks a feature she doens’t particularly like about the love interest, and by the end they are her favourite feature. Solomon made sure to pack everything Barrett was feeling, and every single change of her feelings, into the novel, which is I think what impacted on the progression of the plot in some cases.

The audiobook narrator, Emily Lawrence, was also amazing. I’ve listened to something by her before, but I can’t remember what, and her voice was familiar. She absolutely nailed Barrett and gave individual voices to all of the other female characters, and her male voice impression for Miles was decent and believable.

Overall while this is not my favourite novel, I am thoroughly impressed by Solomon, super excited to read the other books I have by her, and know that she will be a trustworthy author for me in the future, if I like the sound of the blurb.

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