In Five Years by Rebecca Serle is one of the best women’s friendship fiction, totally different from other books. The main character of the book is Dannie Kohan. She’s well on her way to fulfilling her life goals and has a perfect husband with a luxurious life. One day, she falls asleep, only to wake up in a different apartment with another ring on her finger and in the company of a very different man. It’s the same night, December 15th, but 2025, five years in the future.
It was a dream, and she told herself when she woke. But it felt natural, determined to ignore the odd experience, and she filed it in her mind. That is until five years later when Dannie meets the man from his dreams, which isn’t what she was expecting.
Dannie does wake up, skip the past five years of her life, and then follows her fiance and best friend for the entire year. It is a cute little romance novel. Also, it’s interesting to see how the author has made those things happen.
Books like In Five Years offer the complexities of human relationships, personal growth, and the impact of pivotal moments in our lives. They touch upon love, fate, second chances, and self-discovery, evoking emotions and offering insightful perspectives on the human experience.
7 Books Like In Five Years (Women’s Friendship Fiction)
“In Five Years” combines love and a touch of magical realism. We think girls are jealous and selfish, but the book In Five Years breaks this concept and creates a new psychological discovery. This book shows how two women feel about each other and how their friendship builds strongly. This type of story will destroy your thinking and belief as a man.
You will learn something new about women’s world and psychology. Do you want to read more? I’m going to discuss seven books similar to In Five Years. Let’s go!
1. The Last Flight
The Last Flight starts with the two women who both hate their lives. They hate their lives so much that they serendipitously find themselves sitting next to each other in an airport. They abandon their previous lives altogether, switch places with each other, change identities, and change plane tickets. Then the story becomes even crazier when one of those planes ends up the crash.
At the very beginning, the plot seemed too contrived, where it was all of these different plot elements and tropes. They were all thrown in in the first few chapters. Also, the writing style felt slightly too contrived, especially at the beginning.
Like In Five Years, this book did a great job of establishing a real sense of impending doom or danger. It was a true thriller in every sense of the word. You had the ticking clock and villains. The book’s central concept was interesting, but the subplots add depth and dimension to the story.
Author: Julie Clark
Average Rating: 4.4/5
Category: Women’s Psychological Fiction, Domestic Thrillers
Available: Audiobook | Paperback | Hardcover | Kindle | Audio CD
2. Every Last Secret
The story revolves around a husband and wife named William and Cat Winthorpe. Cat has struggled and worked hard to have a good social standing. She has a wealthy husband and a lavish lifestyle. Then one day, they get new neighbors, and her husband might have moved next door.
Neena immediately latches on to William. Neena works in Williams’s company as a life coach, and she soon sets her targets on William. She thinks of William as the next best thing that could happen to her financially and socially. Also, she wants to ensure Cat is out of the picture.
So then, what starts as an infatuation soon turns into an obsession for Neena, where she has to get William even though she is friends with Cat. She wants to ensure that Cat is out of the picture, so the story continues with these two women fighting over the same man. It slowly starts with jealousy, then becomes toxic, eventually leading to attempted murder. The story begins with Neena being questioned by the police for murder. So you don’t know exactly who her target is.
Cat and Neena are fantastic characters, and the author deliciously wrote both. From the get-go, you start to hate Neena for how she latches onto William and how she would do anything to get him. What I liked about Neena’s character is how she knows how to read the psychology of people and how she studies behavior well.
So it was more like watching chess gameplay where she looked two steps ahead. She’s planning her very carefully and knows how to act at the right time to capture her feelings slowly. On the other hand, Cat is a lovable wife, and she knows that something is wrong because she knows people like Neena and wants to stop her. But at the same time, she also wants to give her husband the benefit of the doubt and trust him to ensure he will not do anything stupid.
As the story continues, things will not progress as you want. The story ends as soon as the climax ends and the book finishes. I have noticed in most of the thrillers that I read. But in this book, the author spends ample time with a few chapters post the climax to give us the impact of the consequences of whatever happened.
Every Last Secret gives you a sense of satisfaction and enclosure to the characters and the storyline, and you don’t feel the story ends abruptly. The author still keeps you on the edge because she writes the story in such a manner that you feel like something might happen again. Also, the characters and plot are very similar to In Five Years.
Author: A. R. Torre
Average Rating: 4.3/5
Category: Women’s Friendship Fiction, Psychological Fiction
Available: Audiobook | Paperback | Kindle | Audio CD
3. The Seven Husbands of Evelyn Hugo
This is an adult stand-alone historical fiction mixed with some contemporary, where Evelyn Hugo is an aging starlet. She’s about 80 years old. She has been a starlet in Hollywood since the fifties, and she has never done interviews or shared much about her life story. But then she contacts a magazine, says she will interview, and requests one of their junior journalists, Monique. So Monique goes there, and Evelyn gives her life story as she did for no one before.
The Seven Husbands of Evelyn Hugo is broken up into eras based on husbands. So you get back into the fifties before Evelyn was even a child. You will feel that, especially in Hollywood glamour.
Evelyn Hugo is a Marilyn Monroe-type character, and you will feel what’s happening around you. She is a powerhouse, beautiful, cunning, ambitious woman, and it’s impossible not to love her. She’s one of those who only has a few people in her life that she loves and trusts. Those people are so vital to her.
We get a contemporary part of the story and life lessons about herself. Hugo is also bisexual and is an integral part of the story. Like In Five Years, It shows how that would affect somebody both now and at that time. It was wonderfully done because you had her in the present and the past saying she was bisexual. We also have many people surrounding her and other co-stars and husbands.
So, there were a lot of family elements with some of the people she was with throughout her life. One of her best friends is a constant throughout her life.
Author: Taylor Jenkins Reid
Average Rating: 4.6/5
Category: Women’s Divorce Fiction, American Literature (Best Seller)
Available: Audiobook | Paperback | Hardcover | Kindle | Audio CD
4. Truly Madly Guilty
A huge tragic event happens, as in most of Liane’s books. You take most of the book to get to that event to explore what it is. We have three different couples, and these couples come together, and they have a barbecue. They are Erika, Sam, and Clementine, who are almost like sisters. They’ve been best friends ever since forever. But you learn throughout this book that they have a very strained and harsh relationship where it’s one-sided. There are also a lot of marriage problems in this book.
Truly Madly Guilty explores the same themes of marriage and friendship, similar to In Five Years. However, how you react to a crisis is also a theme. Clementine and Erika are best friends in this story, but their friendship is complicated. One day they go to a cookout.
Clementine and her family go to a cookout at Erika and Oliver’s neighbor’s house. It’s a day that they wish never happened. What I like most about Liane Moriarty is her character’s internal dialogue, so you get inside the head of all the characters.
Author: Liane Moriarty
Average Rating: 3.9/5
Category: Psychological Fiction, Women Literature & Fiction
Available: Audiobook | Paperback | Hardcover | Kindle
5. Verity
This book is not Hoover’s typical emotional romance genre. The story follows a girl named Lowen Ashleigh. She’s not a very successful writer. She is super broke and struggles to get book deals. She gets offered a fat deal to finish a book series by the author of Verity Crawford. She’s been in an accident and needs three books of her series written. They are working to deal with her to finish the series.
Verity has been in an accident, so she has significant brain damage. She can’t move; she can’t talk like she’s a vegetable. Lowen is in this house, going through Verity’s office, looking through her manuscripts, trying to figure out the best way to finish this series. She gets closer to Verity’s husband, Jeremy, who is very handsome and mysterious. Lowen comes across a manuscript in Verity’s office that starts an autobiography that she was writing. We quickly find out that Verity is one sick, twisted sister.
This book has some dark, twisted moments that made me physically nauseous, which is a compliment because it takes a lot. The writing of this was incredible. This book reminded me of the book In Five Years. The story is not the same, but it’s that exact aspect, and the character reminds me of dark secrets.
Read this book! It’s twisted and dark and will mess you up in the head. There are some romantic aspects to this. You do get some of that, and you get your fill. But for the most part, this is straight like mystery and thriller.
Author: Colleen Hoover
Average Rating: 4.6/5
Category: Romantic Suspense
Available: Audiobook | Paperback | Kindle | Audio CD
6. The Light We Lost by Jill Santopolo
The Light We Lost is a heartfelt novel that follows the journey of Lucy and Gabe. They meet on September 11th, 2001, and are forever linked by that fateful day. The book focuses on their complex relationship over many years, exploring fate, timing, and the enduring power of love.
7. One Day by David Nicholls
One Day tells the story of Emma and Dexter. They met on July 15th, 1988, and the narrative follows their lives by checking in on that same date each year. The book explores their evolving friendship, individual challenges, and the transformative power of relationships over time.
These books share love, personal growth, and the exploration of deeper connections, which resonate with readers who enjoyed “In Five Years.” The protagonists in these books are relatable. Their journeys of self-discovery, navigating relationships, and facing challenges can resonate with readers on a personal level.
More Friendship & Romance Books
Books Like One Day In December
Friendship Fiction Books About Cousins
Books Like Conversations With Friends
Brothers Best Friend Romance Books
Childhood Friends To Lovers Books
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