The Twelve Days of Dash and Lily by Rachel Cohn, David Levithan

The Twelve Days of Dash and Lily (Dash & Lily, #2)

by Rachel Cohn and David Levithan

'After reading this I wanted to read it all over again' - Zoe Sugg aka Zoella.

This glorious new collaboration from the New York Times bestselling authors of Nick & Norah’s Infinite Playlist was personally selected by Zoella for the Zoella Book Club. A teen romance set against the magical backdrop of New York City in December. It is the ultimate Christmas book.

Dash and Lily have been dating for nearly a year, but when Lily’s beloved grandfather falls ill, the repercussions take their toll on everyone. Even though they are still together, somehow the magic has gone out of their relationship and it’s clear that Lily has fallen out of love with life.

Action must be taken! Dash teams up with Lily’s brother and a host of their friends, who have just twelve days to get Lily’s groove back in time for Christmas.

A warm, wintry read that is guaranteed to be a favourite Christmas book for many years to come.

Look out for David and Rachel’s other young adult novels:  Nick and Norah's Infinite Playlist and Naomi and Ely's No Kiss List.

Also by David Levithan, Every Day, Another Day, Marly's Ghost, Two Boys Kissing, How They Met and Other Stories.

David is the New York Times best-selling author of Boy Meets Boy and Marly’s Ghost. While among his many collaborations are Will Grayson, Will Grayson with Fault in Our Stars author John Green, and Nick and Norah’s Infinite Playlist with Rachel Cohn, which became a major film. Tiny Cooper from Will Grayson, Will Grayson, now has his own novel: Hold Me Closer: The Tiny Cooper Story. David is also a highly respected children’s book editor, whose list includes many luminaries of children’s literature, including Garth Nix, Libba Bray and Suzanne Collins. He lives and works in New York.

Rachel Cohn was born in Maryland, but later moved to New York. Her first novel, Gingerbread, was published in 2002. Since then she has gone on to write many other successful young adult and children's books, several in collaboration with David Levithan. She now lives and writes in Los Angeles, assisted by two very cool cats.

Reviewed by readingwithwrin on

4 of 5 stars

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"I'd spent my whole life avoiding Christmas. But not this year. No, this year what I wanted most this season was for Lily to be happy again."

See reviews first on my blog


Dash and Lily are back. Except things are a lot different this time. Dash is more into Christmas this year than Lily is. Because Lily has no time for it, between school, SAT prep, taking care of grandpa, her job, and doing homework she has no free time for Christmas or Dash really. So Dash does what he can to try to cheer Lily up. But things don't exactly turn out as he hoped they would and instead they take an almost horribly turn. Thankfully though things end up getting worked out and they just might turn out to be good.

"Maybe if it were up to me I wouldn't have the whole world collectively believe in Santa Claus, but I would definitely have them collectively believe in something because there is a messed-up kind of beauty in the way we can all bend over backward to make life seem magical when we want to. In other words, after giving it some thought, I think that reality has the distinct potential to completely suck, and the way to get around that is to step out of reality from time to time and find something a little more enjoyable with someone you completely, unadulterated enjoy. In my life, that's you. And if it takes dressing up like Santa to get that across to you, then so be it."

When I first finished this book I wasn't really happy with it. But the more I got to thinking about it and started to figure out why I didn't like it as much. I realized that the problem was that I did like it and I wasn't sure how to deal with that, because of how I felt about the first one. In this book, Dash and Lily are out of the honeymoon phase of their relationship. Things aren't all sunshine and rainbows and real life has been happening all around them. Lily isn't this little ball of sunshine anymore instead she's stressed out to the max teenager who is dealing with a lot of different things. And Dash well he's happier then he used to be, sure he's also slightly stressed out, but mostly he just want lily to be happy and to help her, but he's not exactly sure how until Langston offers him some advice.

"Wherever she is, whatever she's doing- it's not about you. It's about her. And you have to let it be about her. Sometimes we don't want to be found right away. If we step away, it's because we need to be found on our own terms."

The lack of communication these two have is real as well as the problems they face in and outside of there relationship. I found this book honestly refreshing in the ya contemporary category for a change. Dash and Lily were still somewhat the same, but they are also changing and growing.

"But I don't like it, okay? I don't like how everything is changing. It's like when you're a kid, you think that things like the holidays are meant to show you how things always stay the same, how you have the same celebration year after year, and that's why it's so special. But the older you get, the more you realize that, yes there are all these things that link you to the past, and you're using the same words and singing the same songs that have always been there for you, but each time, things have shifted, and you have to deal with that shift."

Now I am honestly glad that a second book was made for these two. Not only was it nice to get back with characters we already knew, but to seem them dealing with real-life problems and not just in the honeymoon phase. Seeing a couple work together and bringing out the best in each other is something that I like reading about more than what the first one was about. Sure we need the honeymoon phase and sunshine and rainbows, but if it's not going to last then I don't like getting invested in these characters. But I can happily say that I do like Dash and Lily now and I hope that maybe in a few more years we get another book about them and how they are doing then.
"I don't know what will happen between him and me in the future, and I hope I'll be okay with whatever does, but I know that no matter what, he was drawn to that notebook because he belongs with us. He's family."

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Reading updates

  • Started reading
  • 1 December, 2016: Finished reading
  • 1 December, 2016: Reviewed