Spoiler Warning: This is a complete annotation guide for the dancing motif with quotes and page numbers.

Dancing appears so often in Beach Read by Emily Henry that it becomes a touchstone of the novel. Dancing together, through good times and bad, is a symbol of love and resilience for the novels’ main character January.

Annotating dance specifically and meticulously is thematically relevant, but also a great way to review the entire book through a specific lens. Grab your annotating supplies and get ready to move through the pages, dancing through kitchen scenes, basements, and the rain.

You’ll need 22 tabs of the same color to annotate dancing in Beach Read by Emily Henry.

One of these tabs will be for you tab key. Pick a highlighter and/or pen that coordinates with your chosen tab color to mark the quotes and margins too.

1. TAB Ch 1, p 2

HIGHLIGHT and/or UNDERLINE:

“We need to dance!”

2. TAB Ch 1, p 3

HIGHLIGHT and/or UNDERLINE:

“…when the world felt dark and scary, love could whisk you off to go dancing….”

3. TAB Ch 2, p 13-14

HIGHLIGHT and/or UNDERLINE:

“There was the kitchen-dancing…ballroom dancing classes…”

4, TAB Ch 2, p 20

HIGHLIGHT and/or UNDERLINE:

“(Oh, ’twas not I who called the constable! I am but a young woman of nine and twenty, not a crotchety old spinster who loathes laughter, fun, song, and dance!).”

5. TAB Ch 8, p 72

HIGHLIGHT and/or UNDERLINE:

“All I know was that we’d ended up dancign with (on?) each other.’

6. TAB Ch 8, p 79

HIGHLIGHT and/or UNDERLINE:

“’Fine,’ Gus said. ‘Then I’ll take you through my research process. I’ll help you lean into your latent nihilism, and you’ll teach me how to sing like no one’s listening, dance like no one’s watching, and love like I’ve never been hurt before.’”

7. TAB Ch 9, p 88

HIGHLIGHT and/or UNDERLINE:

“But I was in pain too, so much of it that for once I couldn’t laugh or dance any measure of it away.”

8. TAB Ch 10, p 93

HIGHLIGHT and/or UNDERLINE:

“…memories of them dancing barefoot in the kitchen…”

9. TAB Ch 10, p 108

HIGHLIGHT and/or UNDERLINE:

“That first touch when we met on the dance floor, featherlight and melting-point hot, careful, intentional.”

10. TAB Ch 12, p 139

HIGHLIGHT and/or UNDERLINE:

“…as we danced in the sweaty frat house basement…”

11. TAB Ch 12, p 142

HIGHLIGHT and/or UNDERLINE:

“…or tap-dancing for attention in any crowd…the tap lessons were my mom’s idea…”

12. TAB Ch 17 “The Dance,” p 186

HIGHLIGHT and/or UNDERLINE: The chapter title AND as much from the chapter’s line dancing scene as you want! 

13. TAB Ch 19, p 219

HIGHLIGHT and/or UNDERLINE:

“There was more dancing.”

14. TAB Ch 20, p 238

HIGHLIGHT and/or UNDERLINE (ALL ON THIS PAGE):

• “The old fairy-princess-can’t-handle-this-cruel-world song and dance.”
• “…more than enough line dancing…”
• “…my breaks largely consist of line dancing.”

15. TAB Ch 21, p 264

HIGHLIGHT and/or UNDERLINE:

“…he would probably never learn to dance in the rain.”

16. TAB Ch 23, p 289

HIGHLIGHT and/or UNDERLINE:

“…the same two flasks he’d taken to line dancing.”

17. TAB Ch 24, p 300

HIGHLIGHT and/or UNDERLINE:

“If you can learn how to dance in the rain—”

18. TAB Ch 24, p 305

HIGHLIGHT and/or UNDERLINE:

“…a bar with a line dancing night…”

19. TAB Ch 24, p 310

HIGHLIGHT and/or UNDERLINE:

“…gritting my teeth trying to socially tap-dance …”

20. TAB Ch 27, p 342-3

HIGHLIGHT and/or UNDERLINE (ALL ON THE SAME PAGE):

• “…I thought maybe we’d dance.”
• “…dance with me in the rain?”
• “…a tender approximation of a dance, the inverse of that night we’d spent at hte frat party…”

21. TAB Ch 27, p 347

HIGHLIGHT and/or UNDERLINE:

“…we stood there, learning to dance in the rain.”

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