Guest post by Serendipity author Becky Chalsen
Becky Chalsen is a writer and film/TV development executive. She is a graduate of the University of Pennsylvania, and now lives in New York City. Becky is a quadruplet and is married to her high school sweetheart – an identical twin – whose family has spent summers on Fire Island for more than three decades. Her debut novel Kismet was published by Dutton in 2023. Serendipity is her second novel.
About Serendipity: This summer, will three weekends in a Fire Island share house be enough time for Maggie Monroe to fix her life, find love, and make sure she doesn’t lose her friends for good?
Is there anything more magical than checking into a rental house with a group of friends? Some of my favorite memories involve squeezing as many bodies as physically possible into a vacation home, staying up late listening to your friends’ laughter and waking up early to the sound of someone making scrambled eggs, the smell of coffee brewing in the kitchen. The buzz feels like part sleepover, part summer camp, with a generous sprinkle of getting to stay up past your bedtime.
Yet sharing small spaces makes it hard to eschew the less glamorous sides of group travel. The practicalities, like the bathroom schedule jigsaw or competing for the sole blow dryer, are only augmented by the emotional minefields, like wanting to avoid a friend’s new-and-less-than-universally-loved significant other who tagged along for the trip, or a late-night (and potentially tequila-fueled) argument turning into an awkward morning at the kitchen table for all parties, with a hangover to boot.
My most memorable rental was at age twenty-five, when my high school friends rented a share house in Ocean Beach, Fire Island. Fire Island is accessible only via ferry, which means that the streets are filled solely with pedestrians and bikini-clad bicyclists calling out, “on your left.” It also means that there are no cars, so any dramatic exit plan must adhere to a not-so-frequent ferry schedule. Luckily, that summer, the ferry schedule wasn’t a problem. Instead, we built sandcastles and played silly games and sang off-key karaoke; we drank rocket fuels and ate cold cheese pizza (both Ocean Beach specialties) and danced until our flip-flops fell apart. It wasn’t without growing pains – at the time, I remember grappling with immense career anxiety – but though my sunburns begged to differ, I left that summer feeling healed.
This is the magic that I wanted to capture in my novel Serendipity, which follows a group of friends who similarly rent a share house in Fire Island for three summer weekends. Because I firmly believe that a trip is the perfect backdrop to explore themes of a complicated friend-group, and to pay homage to the beautiful humanity that is our long-term relationships. Besides, who doesn’t love strapping messy, big-hearted characters into a rental house for a weekend at the beach?
In that same spirit, I’m thrilled to share some of my favorite stories that feature the highs and lows of a friend group getaway, perfect reading material for any upcoming trips or staycations (with friends, family, or, for perhaps the wisest among us, solo travel.)
Happy Place by Emily Henry
I’m always a sucker for Emily Henry’s witty banter and heart-soaring romance, but I think my favorite scene from her 2023 bestselling novel Happy Place is when we get to watch Harriett and her best friends stroll the streets of Knott’s Harbor, Maine perusing bookstores and the local bar scene, falling into a familiar lockstep despite the years that have passed in between. Come for the second chance romance between Harriett and Wyn – a recently-broken up couple who must fake that they are still dating for the sake of the trip — but stay for the themes of found family and friend group growth. This surely won’t be the first time you’re seeing Happy Place on a recommendation list, and because of Henry’s warm and wonderful writing, it won’t be the last.
In Five Years by Rebecca Serle
In my personal Mt. Rushmore, Rebecca Serle hails queen of the Atmospheric Novel. Her characters’ meals will make you hungry, their apartments will materialize as Zillow listings in your head, and her settings make you feel like you’ve registered for a new mailing address by the turn of her last page. And while In Five Years is set predominantly in the streets of New York City, it features a weekend trip to the Hamptons that will make you feel like you’ve grown up saying the phrase “Out East.” As Dannie and her posse settle into the beautiful beach house – assigning rooms, cooking dinner, taking in the ocean breeze – I could smell the salt air through the pages. It had the magic splendor of sharing space with new and old friends, but I also loved getting to see how that getaway directly impacted Dannie’s relationships and journeys once she’d returned back to her real and regular programming in NYC. Filled with heart, magic, and humanity, In Five Years is the perfect escape.
The Five-Star Weekend by Elin Hilderbrand
A list about vacations wouldn’t be complete without a highlight from Beach Read Queen, Elin Hilderbrand, and her twenty-ninth novel The Five-Star Weekend reinvents the friend group trip concept in a completely charming and captivating way. After suffering a major heartbreak, protagonist Hollis Shaw decides to host a “Five-Star Weekend” on Nantucket by inviting one best friend from each phase of her life: her teenage years, her twenties, her thirties, and her midlife. What follows is a surprising, summery story of friendship, love, relationships, and growth. Reading Hilderbrand’s novels always feel like you’ve been transported to Nantucket’s shores, and The Five-Star Weekend is no exception.
Best Men by Sidney Karger
In my (biased) opinion, there is no better place for a friend group share house than the beloved Fire Island, and I was so excited when I read Sidney Karger’s debut Best Men last year and was treated to a weekend getaway in Fire Island Pines. The Pines are famous for being an LGBTQIA+ harbor and hotspot, and in Sidney’s debut, it’s the perfect locale for the (titular) gay Best Men, Max and Chasten, to visit as part of the bride Paige’s bachelorette party weekend. The beach scenes and vivid nightlife jump right off the page, but I most loved the moments between the group at the house. The group cooks dinner, goes swimming, spends time with old friends and new as Max also grapples with the growing pains of his best friend moving onto a new life chapter without him. Laugh out loud funny, and a moving portrait of long-term friendship, Best Men has a forever spot as one of my favorite reads.
Girls’ Night Out by Liz Fenton and Lisa Steinke
Traveling with friends isn’t always sunshine and rainbows, and Liz Fenton & Lisa Steinke know this best. Despite its picture-perfect location of Tulum, Mexico, their thriller Girls’ Night Out ends up being the setting of friend-trip-nightmares when one girl goes missing. What starts as three women embarking on a group trip to Mexico to repair their bonds turns into a chilling, page-turning, dual-timeline mystery that demands to be inhaled. The settings are breath-taking, but it’s in the nuanced subtleties of Ashley, Natalie and Lauren’s complicated relationships where Fenton and Steinke’s voice really shines. Given that Fenton and Steinke have been real-life besties for over thirty years (since high school!) and written eight books together, it’s no surprise that they are the experts when it comes to crafting a story about the importance of friendship.
Friends in Napa by Sheila Yasmin Marikar
The title says it all! From Mindy’s Book Studio, Sheila Yasmin Marikar’s sophomore novel Friends in Napa is a darkly comedic mystery, as deliciously tantalizing as gossiping with a great friend over the perfect glass of wine. When Raj and Rachel Ranjani invite their closest friends from college for a reunion weekend in Napa Valley, California, they’re excited to celebrate the grand opening of their new luxury high-end winery. But tensions are immediately high upon the group’s arrival, and it doesn’t take much vino for secrets to spill and the illusion of friendship to crack when a dead body is discovered. It’s a look at the power, privilege, and identity strains that can arise amongst friends, making for a page-turning summer read.
Who We Are Now by Lauryn Chamberlain
Friend group trips aren’t exclusive to beachy destinations, though! One of my favorite getaways featured in a book swapped sunscreen and beach chairs for ski goggles and chair lifts, and I couldn’t have loved it more. While the majority of Lauryn Chamberlain’s dazzling sophomore novel Who We Are Now is set in New York City, following four college best friends as they navigate post-grad careers, relationships, and families, and health, a major plot climax happens outside the city during a friend group ski trip. Chamberlain’s entire novel is filled to the brim with beautiful odes to the loyalty, kinship, jealousy, and adoration that can come as college friends enter the real world together. This ski getaway will leave you gasping, gut-punched, and Googling how to take a shot ski.
In A Dark, Dark Wood by Ruth Ware
On the other end of the destination bachelorette party spectrum from the aforementioned Best Men, meet Ruth Ware’s unputdownable, instant classic, In A Dark, Dark Wood. When Nora is invited to her estranged best friend Clare’s “hen party” for a weekend in a remote English countryside cabin – a glass house in the middle of the woods – she’s anxious but tentatively hopeful that it might be the first step towards mending the friendship. But what should be a cozy, celebratory weekend turns into something much worse, In A Dark, Dark Wood teaches us an age-old lesson: when invited to a group getaway that you have any hesitation about attending, decline! I couldn’t put this thriller down.
Dele Weds Destiny by Tomi Obaro
A wedding is the perfect occasion for a friend group reunion trip, at least in the case of Tomi Obaro’s sensational debut. Funmi, Enitan and Zainab, former best college friends who are now in their forties, reunite in Lagos for one of their daughters’ weddings. It’s rare to read a novel where all three female characters feel so fully realized, the ebb-and-flow of their relationships so realistic, that the storylines truly come to life, yet Obaro pulls this off with effortless mastery. Getting to spend time with the women during their pivotal university years was a perfect way to study the lasting bonds of friendship. Part friendship reunion, part wedding drama, part love story, this is an illuminating novel not to be missed!
The Summer Pact by Emily Giffin
Okay, maybe this is cheating because I haven’t technically read Emily Giffin’s newest novel yet, but this one is already at the top of the list for my July most anticipated reads. The Summer Pact publishes on July 9th and is sure to be a moving portrait about the people who help patch up our broken pieces. The premise: in college, four friends made a promise to always be there in any of their times of need. Now, when Hannah experiences an unexpected tragedy, she calls on her college best friends who, despite their recent distance, agree to escape to Capri, Italy together. Sure to be a powerful love story about friendship, grief, and healing, I can’t wait to sob into my beach chair with this in my hands come July.
Half Credit: The Vacationers by Emma Straub
Technically, the characters vacationing to Mallorca in The Vacationers are both family and friends, so this might qualify as more of a half credit, but I’d be remiss not to include Emma Straub’s keenly observed ode to group travel in my round-up. The Vacationers has been one of my favorite books since it published in 2014, because of how vivid a portrait Straub paints of long-term relationships, well-kept secrets, and the highs-and-lows of a family getaway. With Straub’s signature braided storytelling and clever character quirks, this is a family vacation story that might even make you grateful for your own brand of family dysfunction, while of course, enticing you to book a trip to Mallorca.
