OUR WAY BACK TO ALWAYS

Former best friends find their ways back to each other while completing their senior year bucket list.

Luisa and Samuel live across the street from each other, and they were inseparable until the seventh grade. A middle school promposal incident caused a rift that each blamed the other for; then Lou went to Colombia for the summer before either had the chance to apologize or clear the air, and afterward they stopped hanging out with each other. Five years later, while cleaning her room, Lou finds the old list they created of things to do before high school graduation and decides to complete the tasks. When Sam finds out what she is doing, he insists that they finish it together. As they begin to repair their friendship, romance blooms, and both Sam and Lou try to reconcile these new feelings while also dealing with decisions about their futures after high school. Told in alternating viewpoints, the exploration of both grief and family relationships in Latinx communities is strongly written, and the complexities are expertly explored. Diverse representation is another strength of the book, not only in the biracial main characters—Sam is White and Cuban, Lou is White and Colombian—but also in the supporting characters, who include Afro-Cuban, Chinese American, South Asian, and Puerto Rican individuals. The friends-to-lovers story is comfortably familiar and absolutely enjoyable.

A coming-of-age story with a good balance of humor and romance.