Just Friends
Just Friends
By: Haley Pham
[Fulfills the prompt: ‘Book you had to wait for its release’ for the Shelf Reflection 2026 Reading Challenge]
[On my list of Most Anticipated Books of 2026]
I didn’t just like this book because it released on my birthday, but that was fun.
I liked it because it was a charming, heartwarming love story that also had threads of friendship and grief, showing how real relationships are meant to support us when things are hard.
I know Haley Pham has millions of follows on Instagram and YouTube, but I actually heard about this book through her husband’s YouTube channel when he and Haley filmed the 50 States in 50 Days summer series last year.
Because of that, I think I’m writing this review from a somewhat unique perspective.
First: the only information I knew about Haley was what I saw on Ryan’s summer series. I didn’t follow her or watch any of her videos. I went into reading this with absolutely no preconceived notions about what kind of writer I expected her to be or her writing to be like.
I can see how it could be disappointing for some readers who already felt like they ‘knew’ her and then felt like the writing didn’t live up to it. The bigger the hype, the more famous the author, the more pressure and expectation put on the finished product.
Second: I don’t read a lot of romance books. I actually tend to avoid them. These days anything with romance ends up being smut which is annoying. You’ll find some romances reviewed on my website but they are typically rom-coms because if we’re going to do the romance thing let’s at least laugh too.
Thus… I don’t have a lot to compare this book to. I think the more you read of one particular genre the more critical you tend to be of it because you develop a specific taste and list of preferences.
I think these two things makes my review different than a lot of others.
I was surprised by the Goodreads ratings on this book. A lot of the negative reviews seem a bit over-the-top, but everyone’s way of reviewing is different. My scale isn’t as extreme as others.
It seems to me that a lot of the negativity stems from her being famous (rich?) and popular or the reader preferring a different type of romance. Some felt like the book read more middle-grade but I disagree.
I think maybe compared to the sex-saturated romance novels full of f-words, sure, it might feel like middle grade but that’s like saying that roller coasters are for babies because you just got done sky-diving and that was way more thrilling. Relax… not everyone wants to freefall from the sky. It doesn’t make them babies.
It’s probably closer to YA than adult but I still wouldn’t call it middle-grade.
A few others critiqued that Haley wrote herself into the main character. Like it was a bad thing. I don’t know the rules of writing but isn’t there something like ‘write what you know’? It’s her first book. It seems fitting to add some of herself into it. I admit, I did mostly just picture her as Blair, especially when she wrote that Blair liked hydrangeas because I remembered from the summer series one of the videos where Haley was excited to see them. I didn’t mind noticing those details. It actually made sense to me that she did that.
I’m sure if she writes another book she will diversify her characters. And at least she didn’t make Declan the same as Ryan (he was a runner not a football player). That kind of writing could probably go to the extreme and detract from the story, but I don’t think it did that here.
BUT ALL THAT TO SAY…
I thought this was a sweet story of second-chance, friends-to-lovers romance.
With the setting being in a cozy, picturesque seaside village in California, I think it makes a good beach-read. Even though it deals with grief, it’s mostly just a light, fun read.
Blair is our main character. Having just graduated from Pepperdine she is headed to New York to begin a career she hopes will help financially support her single mother. Plans change when her great-aunt Lottie’s health takes a turn for the worse.
Blair delays New York and goes back to her hometown where she was basically raised by her mother and Lottie and spends Lottie’s last few days with her. Reeling from the grief once Lottie has passed, she is unprepared for the run-in she has with her ex, Declan, who runs the coffee shop she gets a temporary job at.
They grew up best friends until they finally acknowledged they had the hots for each other in high school. Declan was a football star headed to the pros and Blair was an aspiring writer. An accident was the catalyst to the end of that relationship. We don’t fully know why, we just know something bad happened.
“Declan, to me, became like a blade buried deep in my side. Over the years, he fused so completely that removing him from my life seemed life-threatening. And then he was ripped away from me overnight, and I’d been trying to clot the bleeding ever since. How would I survive being near him again when the original wound never healed?”
The details unfurl as the book goes along and Blair and Declan realize they never should have stayed apart.
But the grief Blair feels with losing Lottie and her fears of Declan being like her father and eventually leaving are clouding her judgment and ability to know if she can enter back into the relationship.
I thought Haley did a good job expressing the confusing ups and downs of grief. I thought there was a lot of maturity in Blair as she realizes other people don’t always know how to help grieving people.
She holds it against her two college friends that they aren’t being there for her the way she wants them to be and adds ‘victim’ to her grief. But then she realizes that she hasn’t shared much with them about what’s going on and they’re miles and miles away. They don’t know.
When she is finally vulnerable with them and asks them to come, they drop everything and come. I think that’s a really realistic take on friendship.
“People in your life could only be as close to you as you let them.”
We tend to privately put expectations on people and then take it personally when they don’t measure up. We can’t and shouldn’t be the center of everyone’s universe. If we get that posture right, then we can be honest with people about what we need and we can show up for each other, having some grace when people don’t respond the way we were hoping they would.
So I enjoyed that added thread of friendship within the romance story. I think a lot of romances are so focused on sexual tension that there are no other relationships involved as if a person only needs one person in their life. People need friends too! I thought that was well-balanced in this book.
As for the romance. I thought it was cute. Perhaps cheesy at times but I think that just comes with the territory. People are cheesy when they’re in love. These are college-aged kids. This is how it goes. It made me think a lot of my husband and my relationship in college and I thought Haley did a good job of capturing what that looks and feels like.
When Blair is struggling with whether or not to get back with Declan, a different character has caused her to question her motives and second-guess whether she can trust herself to make that decision when she is distraught and emotionally spent.
I don’t think it’s trying to promote a ‘follow your heart, your feelings can never steer you wrong’ kind of mentality, but more so that you don’t have to have it all together to be with someone. You can be grieving and not be a burden to someone you love. They want to be there for you through that. Just like they would expect you to show up when they go through something hard.
No relationship is without some messiness. But relationships are a mess worth making. We’re not meant to go through life alone. We are not meant to be self-reliant people. Love is love because it is shared. And true love is unconditional.
I look back at my husband’s and my carefree college love and see where we are now and I choose the emotionally weathered and a little stressed version of ourselves every time because the hard times we went through together authenticated and grew our love in ways our naive college selves never could have predicted.
Sure, the whole missing letter thing is a miscommunication trope that I don’t especially love, but overall I liked the dilemma she put in front of her characters and I liked the way they came through it.
I also liked the little details of the book like the letter graphic and the chapter illustrations that helped the reader differentiate between timelines. I wish more books did that! It would make shifting character POVs or timelines so much easier while reading.
The cover was fitting and cute as well.
The only critiques I had were that a lot of her sentences felt too long. I think it must just be her writing style to have long sentences with a lot of commas and descriptions. I just think some well-placed short sentences can do a lot to engage the reader.
I can also see some reviewers’ dissatisfaction with the way things wrapped up financially for Blair and her mom. I think it made perfect sense with their background with Lottie— I’m not saying it was incongruent with the story— but I can understand people’s desire to see her have to figure out a way to pinch pennies to follow her dream instead of dropping it in her lap where she can do it without a worry about the future.
Usually people who decide to follow a dream or a calling have to make some sort of sacrifice and take a leap of faith. I’m happy Blair got to pursue writing like she felt called to do, but it didn’t feel like a leap of faith.
That is a small critique. I’m usually a fan of happy endings though so I’m not mad about it. I don’t need book characters to reflect my personal life. I might care about relatability more when it comes to memoirs than fiction. Enjoy the house, Blair; I’m cool with it, but I would love to visit sometime if you’re free.
Recommendation
Yeah, I would recommend this book! Especially if you like clean, cute, charming romances with happy endings.
If you are looking for a rated-R romance that’s gritty and whatever other adjectives the negative reviewers prefer to describe their romances, then perhaps this wouldn’t be the right fit.
Like I said, it’s a good beach read and palate cleanser. And for someone who doesn’t take in a lot of romance novels and has no fandom or anti-fandom towards Haley, I had no unmet expectations!
This gets a thumbs-up for me!
[Content Advisory: one incomplete s-word; no sexual content other than kissing]
This book released in March, 2026. You can order a copy of this book using my affiliate link below.
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