# Great Big Beautiful Life

By Emily Henry

Profile: https://hahafiction.com/books/great-big-beautiful-life-a98e7bad/

Alice Scott and Pulitzer winner Hayden Anderson have a month on Little Crescent Island to compete for the chance to write Margaret Ives’s biography. The reclusive heiress gives them separate pieces of her family history, and nondisclosure agreements prevent them from comparing notes. Attraction complicates a contest in which neither writer has the whole story.

## What makes it funny?

Alice introduces herself by listing facts about a famous producer’s marriages, her own uncertain relationship and their shared height. She eventually admits that the research detour is delaying an intimidating interview. Her attempt to sound in command reveals exactly how nervous she is.

### The comedy at work

Alice’s orderly lists keep making room for the personal anxieties they are meant to disguise. Her expansive friendliness also encounters Hayden’s guarded manner, giving the competing writers different ways of handling what they cannot say to each other.

### Try this if…

The slowly developing romance shares substantial space with a family story across generations. Readers interested in competing accounts of the past can follow Margaret’s history alongside the sparring between the people trying to record it.

### Good to know

Historical episodes cover media wealth, early Hollywood and romantic loss. Grief and tragic family history are prominent, and the present-day romance includes sexual heat.

## What to expect

- Genre: Romance
- On the shelf: Contemporary romance · Romantic comedy
- Kind of humor: Banter
- The atmosphere: Warmhearted
- Format: Novel
- Length: 432 pages
- Audiobook: 12 hr 2 min
- Published: 2025

## A few distinguishing details

- Two rival biographers interviewing the same reclusive heiress
- Nondisclosure agreements prevent comparing family stories
- An anxious narrator whose fact lists become personal

## Sources & further reading

- Publisher: [Penguin Random House Library Marketing identifies Great Big Beautiful Life: Reese's Book Club by Emily Henry as hardcover, ISBN 9780593441299, 432 pages.](https://penguinrandomhouselibrary.com/book?isbn=9780593441299)
- Book information: [Apple Books lists Great Big Beautiful Life: Reese's Book Club (Unabridged) by Emily Henry, length 12:02, published by Penguin Audio.](https://books.apple.com/us/audiobook/great-big-beautiful-life-reeses-book-club-unabridged/id1767079202)
- Review: [Publishers Weekly review](https://www.publishersweekly.com/978-0-593-44129-9)
- Publisher: [Publisher](https://www.penguin.co.uk/books/455133/great-big-beautiful-life-by-henry-emily/9781405971133)
- Reading sample: [Opening chapter](https://www.bookbrowse.com/excerpts/index.cfm/book_number/5017/page_number/1/great-big-beautiful-life)
- Review: [Kirkus review](https://www.kirkusreviews.com/book-reviews/emily-henry/great-big-beautiful-life)