Is the new novel “It Starts with Us” truly worth reading?

*Spoilers for “It Ends With Us”*

“You can stop swimming now, Lily. We finally reached the shore,” is the last sentence of “It Ends With Us.” Following this book, Colleen Hoover released the sequel “It Starts With Us” on Oct. 18, 2022. The book became a sensation on BookTok, a section of TikTok relating to books. Though the popularity of the book is on the rise, it lacks plot and character development.

This book starts off with Lily meeting Atlas again by accident and how flustered she is. The story carries forth from there with her relationship with him. Though the book is solely a romance novel, the story lacks a plot. Nothing different happens from the last book, and it feels redundant. 

Additionally, we learn about Atlas’ past life. However, there is nothing we did not know from the last book. “He liked the version of me he could push around without being pushed back,” is what Atlas wrote about Tim, the very person that kicked him out as a teenager. We were already aware of this in the first book.

The characters are the exact same as in the previous book. There is no development for better or worse. As in the previous book, Ryle’s jealousy gets the better of him even when he promised to be better for their daughter. “I go to close the door, but before I can take a step back, Ryle moves forward and pushes me until my back is flat against the open living room door,” Lily describes. His never ending jealousy continues to show and it gets really unnecessary. 

The same recurring issues are shown in this book. However, the new characters change up the story a bit. The plot twists definitely help make this book worth reading, but there are only one or two that really stand out.

There are some interesting new characters that change up the story. Theo, a new character, really adds some humor to this otherwise serious story. He is introduced to the story as Atlas’ “therapist” despite being 13. 

His jokes about Atlas’ swimming quote really adds to the story. “Look! It’s sand- we’ve finally reached land,” is just one of the few jokes that lighten the story. It may not necessarily be the most hilarious, but it is an addition that changes it up a little.

Compared to “It Ends With Us,” this book does not exactly reach the standard of an interesting book. When that book came out, it was considered unique because there wasn’t really anything like it. However, when “It Starts With Us” came out, it was the exact same as the previous book. There was nothing really interesting about it. This book could have definitely been more compelling with a little change in the story.

“It Ends With Us” does everything that this book needs. It has plot, character development, and uniqueness. Since all the characters had already developed in the first book, the second book had nothing change between the characters. The first book would’ve been better as a stand-alone because there was nothing to really add to it.