One Day

David Nicholls

Emma and Dexter meet on graduation night in 1988 Edinburgh, and we drop in on them every 15 July for twenty years of near misses

Top picks

Picks suggested by readers, each with one line on why.

Lily King

In her last college year in the 1980s, an aspiring writer falls for one of two inseparable best friends, and it comes back decades later

Both: Romantic

Carley Fortune

Jilted the day before her wedding, Frankie goes on her Tofino honeymoon anyway, with her childhood best friend in place of the groom

Both: Romantic · Slow burn · Friendship

Claire Daverley

A bookish girl and a grieving, reckless boy from one English village start talking late at night at 17, and keep almost getting together

Both: Romantic · Heartbreaking · Slow burn

Jeffrey Eugenides

At Brown in 1982, a romantic English major falls for a volatile biology student while the friend who loves her travels to get over her

Both: Romantic

Miranda Cowley Heller

At her family's Cape Cod summer camp, a woman who just slept with her childhood best friend must choose between him and her husband

Both: Romantic