ARC Review: You Have a Match by Emma Lord

You Have a Match by Emma Lord

Rating: ★★★★★

Links: Amazon • TBD • Goodreads
Publication Date: January 12, 2021
Source: ARC via Netgalley

A new love, a secret sister, and a summer she’ll never forget.

When Abby signs up for a DNA service, it’s mainly to give her friend and secret love interest, Leo, a nudge. After all, she knows who she is already: Avid photographer. Injury-prone tree climber. Best friend to Leo and Connie … although ever since the B.E.I. (Big Embarrassing Incident) with Leo, things have been awkward on that front.

But she didn’t know she’s a younger sister.

When the DNA service reveals Abby has a secret sister, shimmery-haired Instagram star Savannah Tully, it’s hard to believe they’re from the same planet, never mind the same parents—especially considering Savannah, queen of green smoothies, is only a year and a half older than Abby herself.

The logical course of action? Meet up at summer camp (obviously) and figure out why Abby’s parents gave Savvy up for adoption. But there are complications: Savvy is a rigid rule-follower and total narc. Leo is the camp’s co-chef, putting Abby’s growing feelings for him on blast. And her parents have a secret that threatens to unravel everything.

But part of life is showing up, leaning in, and learning to fit all your awkward pieces together. Because sometimes, the hardest things can also be the best ones.

By this point, you may have noticed that I’m in a bit of a pattern of apologizing at the beginning of my reviews. This review is no exception, because I was approved for this ARC on Netgalley in July of 2020, this book released in January 2021, and here we are in October 2022 and I am finally posting my review. My apologies.

But I loved this book, okay? I think I’d probably love anything Emma Lord writes. I even love her Twitter feed! I love her love of Taylor Swift and fanfiction and her sense of humor. I love the stories she comes up with, her characters, her dialogue, all of it. So the fact that I loved You Have a Match is probably not very surprising.

There’s a lot to love about this book. Emma Lord’s writing style is so… charming. I don’t know if that’s the right word, but her books give me this warm, fuzzy feeling. In this book, family relationships take center stage as our main character finds out through a DNA test that she has a sister she didn’t know about. I’ll do a little digression here and say that I have done a DNA test and, given that I was never that close with my dad’s side of the family, I’m always paranoid that I’m going to find out I have a secret sibling! Up to this point, though, the closest relative I’ve found is a second cousin.

In addition to the whole sister thing, there’s a cute little friends-to-lovers romance on the side. We all know how I feel about those, so that was just a little added bonus.

All in all, You Have a Match is another great book from Emma Lord, and it’s cemented her place on my list of auto-read authors.

Thank you to Netgalley and the publisher for the free ARC of You Have a Match in exchange for my honest review.

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