Review by louisekf - What Happens in Amsterdam

louisekf 's review for:

What Happens in Amsterdam by Rachel Lynn Solomon

4.25

emotional funny informative lighthearted reflective medium-paced

Plot or Character Driven: A mix

Strong character development: Yes

Loveable characters: Yes

Diverse cast of characters: Yes

Flaws of characters a main focus: Yes

What Happens In Amsterdam is a second-chance romance and marriage of convenience with a twist. Dani (Danica) is from Los Angeles; Wouter had been an exchange student who stayed with her family when they were 17, and the two of them had fallen in love back then. But once Wouter was back in Amsterdam, he broke it off rather clumsily - I can forgive him for his terrible communication because, well, he was a teenager! Dani had been a preemie and has several medical issues including asthma, and her parents were over-the-top protective, hovering over her even now that she’s 30 years old.

After a workplace disaster, Dani decides to upend her life and move to Amsterdam for a job with a startup in her field (UX, or User Experience, in tech lingo). When that company goes belly-up, she needs a job to be able to stay in the Netherlands. While riding a bike (as one does in Amsterdam), she literally crashes into Wouter. Sort of a meet-cute but of course they used to know each other very well, 13 years before.

The publisher’s blurb talks about their marriage of convenience, so I’m not giving anything away when I say that Wouter eventually steps in to help Dani, partly because he’s a good guy and still has feelings for her, and partly because it’ll help him too, with his family.

There are delightful scenes and descriptions of Amsterdam and the nearby countryside along with history tidbits. (Dani has to get to know Amsterdam, after all.) It gave me a bit of an “Emily in Paris” feel at times. I loved Dani’s sister Phoebe and Wouter’s various relatives. I did NOT care for Dani’s parents, although as a parent myself, I understand at least a little of their concerns.

There’s good LGBTQ+ rep and Dani has anxiety along with her asthma, so there’s neurodivergent rep as well. And Wouter has grief issues over his father’s death (before the events of the book). So we’ve got some perfectly imperfect lead characters, which is nice.

Note that I received an advance copy of this book via a program from Berkley Publishing that focuses on books featuring “underrepresented voices.” Dani is Jewish, as is the author, but Dani being Jewish is an extremely minor aspect of this story, basically irrelevant. I was a tad disappointed in that, since I expected at least a little more Jewish content.

Warning: There are several very explicit scenes between Dani and Wouter.

I mostly listened to the audiobook version (thank you to PRH Audio for the opportunity!). The narrator, Elizabeth Lamont, made the story come alive with all the Dutch accents and words - words I would never have know how to pronounce otherwise, starting with Wouter’s name!

Thank you to Berkley and NetGalley for the opportunity to read an advance readers copy of this book. All opinions are my own.

Content Warnings