When you pick up an Emily Henry novel, you expect certain delightful things: witty banter that crackles off the page, a swoon-worthy slow-burn romance, and a sun-drenched setting that feels like a vacation in itself. Henry has rightfully earned her crown as the queen of the contemporary “beach read.” But with her latest offering, Great Big Beautiful Life, she has quietly and brilliantly subverted expectations, delivering her most ambitious and emotionally resonant novel to date.
While the story begins with the familiar, irresistible premise of rival writers competing for a career-making project, it quickly blossoms into something far grander.
This is not just a romance. It is a sweeping, multi-generational family saga, a poignant mystery, and a profound meditation on the very nature of truth and storytelling. It’s a book that lures you in with the promise of a summer fling and leaves you contemplating the weight of history, the secrets we keep, and the legacies we inherit.
This review will delve into the surprising depths of Great Big Beautiful Life, exploring how Emily Henry masterfully weaves a historical epic into a contemporary love story, creating a novel that is as intellectually satisfying as it is emotionally cathartic. Forget what you think you know about the “beach read”; this book redefines the genre.
The Premise: More Than a Meet-Cute on a Georgia Island
The story opens with a premise that feels both classic and electric. Alice Scott, an eternally optimistic and slightly quirky staff writer for the pop-culture site The Scratch, lands the opportunity of a lifetime.
She’s been invited to the secluded Little Crescent Island, Georgia, to pitch herself as the chosen biographer for the legendary and long-reclusive Margaret Ives. Once the “Tabloid Princess” and heiress to a vast media empire, Margaret vanished from public life decades ago, becoming a figure of myth and speculation. For an aspiring biographer like Alice, this is the job dreams are made of.
There’s just one problem, and he comes in the form of a six-foot-three, Pulitzer-prize-winning human thundercloud: Hayden Anderson. Brooding, hyper-competitive, and intimidatingly talented, Hayden is Alice’s direct competition. He’s the critically acclaimed author of Our Friend Len, a biography that Alice herself wept over in a taqueria.
Margaret, now a sly, enigmatic woman in her eighties, proposes a unique and tantalizing challenge: a one-month trial period.
Both Alice and Hayden will stay on the island, spend time with her, and begin preliminary work. At the end of the month, they will present their pitches and a writing sample, and Margaret will choose only one to tell her story.
What follows is a tense, witty, and deeply engaging dance between two writers with opposing methods and personalities, all orbiting the gravitational pull of Margaret Ives and the sprawling, secret-filled history of her infamous family.
Unpeeling the Onion: Margaret Ives and the Ives Family Curse
The true heart of Great Big Beautiful Life lies not in the present-day rivalry, but in the magnificent story-within-a-story that Margaret begins to unfurl.
This is where the novel transcends its genre trappings and becomes a captivating historical saga.
Margaret’s narrative doesn’t start with her own glamorous life but with her great-grandfather, Lawrence Richard Ives, an eighth-born son from a destitute farming family who built a fortune on silver ore and an insatiable hunger born from childhood poverty.
Through Margaret’s telling, Henry paints a vivid picture of the “Ives Curse”—a legacy not of supernatural misfortune, but of the corrosive effects of immense wealth, unchecked power, and the very media empire the family created.
Each generation is shaped and, in many ways, damaged by the one that came before:
- Lawrence Richard Ives: The patriarch who, haunted by the death of a younger brother, becomes a “cold, cruel man with no qualms about taking what wasn’t his.” He buys his first newspaper, the San Francisco Daily Dispatch, not for the love of journalism, but to silence a story about his own treachery, discovering in the process that headlines, not news, are what truly sell.
- Gerald Ives: Lawrence’s son, who grows up in his father’s cold shadow. He inherits the business and transforms it into a media juggernaut, driven by a desperate need for his father’s approval. He weaponizes the press, understanding that “the truth was king, but emotion was the truth’s most valuable adviser.” His personal life is just as calculated, including a strategic marriage and a passionate, secret affair with an actress named Nina Gill, leading to the birth of a secret daughter, Ruth.
- Frederick “Freddy” Ives: Margaret’s father, a “derelict playboy” who is jealous, aimless, and lives in the shadow of his own father’s success. His saving grace is his love for the brilliant, sharp-witted film director Doris “Bernie” Bernhardt, who becomes Margaret’s mother. Their tumultuous relationship, divorce, and enduring friendship form a powerful emotional core of the narrative.
- Laura Ives: Margaret’s younger sister, the tragic figure of the family. Shy, bookish, and sensitive, she wilts under the media scrutiny that Margaret learns to manipulate. Her vulnerability leads her into the clutches of a manipulative cult leader, Dr. David Ryan Atwood, a devastating chapter that has profound consequences for the entire family.
This historical narrative is the book’s masterstroke. It’s rich with detail, emotional complexity, and a sense of tragic inevitability.
As Alice and Hayden listen to Margaret’s stories, they (and the reader) are tasked with piecing together the facts, separating family myth from historical record, and understanding how this epic, century-long drama has shaped the woman sitting before them.
The Slow-Burn Romance: When Professional Rivals Become… Something More
Against this backdrop of historical intrigue, the relationship between Alice and Hayden blossoms in a beautifully paced slow burn. They are a classic “sunshine meets grumpy” pairing, but their dynamic is deepened by their shared profession and intellectual respect.
Alice is all heart, empathy, and a belief in finding the good in everyone. She approaches biography as an act of understanding, of finding the love story within the tragedy. Hayden is driven by a stark, almost brutal pursuit of the unvarnished truth.
He’s guarded, cynical, and sees the world in black and white. Their initial interactions are a delightful clash of wills, filled with the sharp, intelligent banter that is Emily Henry’s signature.
Their forced proximity on Little Crescent Island, however, begins to break down their defenses. Late-night conversations in kitschy island diners, a shared ordeal during a storm, and the simple act of being the only two people on Earth who understand the professional pressure they’re under, forge an undeniable bond.
What makes their romance so compelling is how it’s intrinsically linked to the main plot. Their “work” is to understand Margaret’s life, and in doing so, they are forced to confront their own pasts, vulnerabilities, and beliefs about family, love, and loss. Hayden, who grew up as a mayor’s son under intense scrutiny, begins to understand the pressures Margaret faced. Alice, whose own family history is marked by her sister’s health struggles, connects deeply with Margaret’s fierce, protective love for Laura.
Their relationship isn’t a distraction from the central mystery; it’s the lens through which it is brought into focus. They are not just falling for each other; they are engaged in a collaborative, and sometimes competitive, act of interpretation that forces them to be their most vulnerable and authentic selves.
“Yours, Mine, and the Truth”: The Meta-Narrative on Storytelling
The novel opens with an old quote from film producer Robert Evans: “There are always three versions of them: yours, mine, and the truth.”
This becomes the thematic backbone of Great Big Beautiful Life. The entire book is a fascinating exploration of the ethics and subjectivity of biography.
Alice and Hayden embody two different journalistic philosophies. Alice believes in the “insider looking out,” prioritizing her subject’s voice and emotional truth. Hayden is more of a traditionalist, believing that facts, when pieced together, will reveal an objective reality. The conflict arises when they realize Margaret’s story is not a straightforward recitation of events. It is a curated performance, filled with strategic omissions, half-truths, and outright “discrepancies.”
Margaret isn’t just telling her story; she’s testing them. She wants to see what they will question, what they will accept, and how they will ultimately construct their version of her life. The central mystery of the novel hinges on a series of these discrepancies: a hotel with the wrong name, a secret family connection to the name “Nicollet,” and the true identity of a local restaurant owner.
The book brilliantly engages with the idea of the unreliable narrator, not just in Margaret, but in the nature of memory and family history itself. What is the “truth” of a family? Is it the collection of newspaper headlines and public records?
Or is it the fiercely protected secrets, the whispered apologies, and the love stories that never made it to print? The novel doesn’t offer easy answers, instead suggesting that the “whole awful truth” Margaret claims to want is a complex mosaic of all these conflicting versions.
The shocking final reveals—which connect Hayden’s own family history to the Ives dynasty in an unexpected and powerful way—serve as the ultimate commentary on this theme. The truth, it turns out, was closer than anyone could have possibly imagined.
Why ‘Great Big Beautiful Life’ is Emily Henry’s Most Ambitious Novel Yet
While books like Beach Read and People We Meet on Vacation perfected the modern rom-com formula, Great Big Beautiful Life demonstrates a significant evolution in Emily Henry’s storytelling. The ambition lies in its intricate structure, skillfully braiding three distinct genres into one cohesive whole:
- A Contemporary Romance: The witty, heartfelt story of Alice and Hayden.
- A Historical Family Saga: The epic, tragic history of the Ives media dynasty.
- A Literary Mystery: The puzzle of Margaret’s true motivations and the secrets she is still hiding.
Juggling these elements is a high-wire act, but Henry executes it with breathtaking confidence. The pacing is masterful, alternating between present-day romantic developments and historical flashbacks, with each storyline enriching the other.
The themes are heavier, grappling with generational trauma, the burdens of fame, grief, and the moral complexities of storytelling.
The result is a book that feels weightier and more expansive than her previous work, without sacrificing any of the charm, wit, or emotional punch that her readers adore.
Conclusion: Who Should Read ‘Great Big Beautiful Life’?
Great Big Beautiful Life is a novel that rewards its reader’s investment a hundredfold. It is a story to be savored, to be discussed, and to be revisited. It solidifies Emily Henry’s status not just as a master of romance, but as a truly gifted novelist of remarkable depth and insight.
Read this book if you love:
- Sweeping family sagas with historical depth, in the vein of The Seven Husbands of Evelyn Hugo or Daisy Jones & The Six.
- Character-driven, slow-burn romances with whip-smart dialogue.
- Novels about writers, the nature of stories, and the elusive quest for truth.
- Books that offer both the comfort of a beautifully told love story and the satisfaction of a complex, thought-provoking plot.
This is more than just a book you take to the beach. This is a book that will stay with you long after the summer ends, a great, big, beautiful story that is, in the end, about the stories we tell ourselves and the love that makes them true.