The Do-Over | Book Review
Credit: HarperCollins
The Do-Over by Suzanne Park
About the book: Bestselling author Lily Lee is on a short deadline to deliver her new career guide How to Land the Perfect Job, and she's been interviewing at all the top companies around town. But when she's offered a coveted position at her dream company, the employer's background check reveals she never actually finished her college degree. Unbelievably, her worst nightmare has come true.
Lily returns to her alma mater to relive her senior year of college, after walking across the stage at graduation a decade earlier. Just as she starts getting used to the idea of being a student again, things get even more weird and chaotic when she discovers her computer science TA is her old college boyfriend, Jake Cho.
Told in present day with glimpses of the past, The Do-Over is a delightfully warm and hopeful story about second chances in life and love, and how the future might not be a straight line, but we still end up exactly where we're supposed to be.
Review
In a heartwarming story about second chances, I really enjoyed reading Park’s The Do-Over. In an unfortunate series of events, Lily Lee finds herself back at her alma mater retaking classes to finish the bachelor’s degree she thought she had completed years ago. She gets the opportunity to meet new students and even revisit an old flame, her ex, Jake Cho. This story is relatable to anyone who has dealt with imposter syndrome, anxiety, microaggressions, societal and familiar pressures.