Ready for a YA Romance? Get Your First Heartfelt, Squeal-Worthy Read of 'The Introvert's Guide to Kissing in Europe' (Exclusive)

It’s not easy to step out of your own shell, but after graduating high school, it’s essential. This is exactly what Emily pushes herself to do in The Introvert’s Guide to Kissing in Europe by Brenda Janowitz.

This YA romance is more than just a story of a teenager falling in love. Emily gets to find herself while reliving her grandmother’s younger years. It was always the plan, but not quite the way it played out.

Parade has an exclusive first read of the summer novel, coming out on Aug. 18, 2026. It’s a great chance to understand the heart of Emily’s journey — what was supposed to be, and what is happening now. There’s a heartfelt message within the passages, as we spend a little time with grief when Emily thinks about her sister, who has passed away at some point before the story.

There’s also the story of finding oneself. Emily doesn’t usually take risks. She wouldn’t normally head out on a solo trip around Europe, but the only way she can grow and learn is by doing so. As is brought up in the excerpt, the best way to learn a language is to immerse yourself in it, and anyone who has learned a foreign language will tell you the same thing.

As she’s taking risks, she comes across her favorite social media influencer. Don’t they often say not to meet your heroes? Well, sometimes, maybe they’re not too bad.

That chance encounter takes her on a wild journey of dancing the night away, pickpockets, and heartbreak. She experiences all the good and bad that life has to offer as she works her way through different countries to follow in her grandmother’s — who sometimes she wishes was more like a real grandmother — footsteps.

The excerpt is taken from the third chapter of the story. It’s a chance to see Emily’s first experiences of Spain, a country she thought she’d do well on thanks to high school Spanish. It turns out that her Spanish isn’t as great as she expected, and that’s certainly dented her confidence a little.

CHAPTER 3

My phone buzzed—Grandma Rose on FaceTime.

“Tell me everything,” she said.

“Um . . .”

“That bad already?”

“No,” I said, not wanting to seem ungrateful. After all, the gap year was her idea, and the airline miles it took to fly me here were hers, too. “It’s wonderful. The flight over was great, and the hotel is completely gorgeous.”

“Did you stay up all day to try to get yourself on Madrid time?”

“Um . . .”

“So, no,” she said, laughter in her voice. “But now it looks like you’re at some fabulous Spanish restaurant where you’ll no doubt meet a sexy stranger to help you practice your Spanish?”

“Um . . .”

“Okay, I get it,” she said, nodding. “You need to ease your way in. Nothing wrong with that.”

“I can’t understand anything anyone is saying,” I blurted out, “and no one can understand me.”

Grandma Rose laughed. “I toured the entire world four times, and I never spoke another language as well as you do. Give it time, and when all else fails, just flirt your way through.”

The edges of my mouth turned up. Grandmotherly advice at its finest.

You see, my grandma Rose isn’t like other grandmothers. She doesn’t bake cookies, she can’t sew, and she doesn’t do early bird specials. When we go for dinner, she takes me into the city for a “fabulous evening” (her words) of “delectable treats” (also her words), “unexpected adventures” (yup, still her words), and “thrilling conversation” (I think you get the pattern here).

And yes, she really talks that way.

Sometimes I wonder what it would be like to have a grandmother more like my best friend Amelia’s. A “grandmother” grandmother. Like the ones you see on commercials. Amelia’s grandmother knits a new sweater for her every fall. Amelia’s grandmother’s house always smells like garlic and onions being roasted, and sometimes freshly baked bread. Amelia’s grandmother’s house has floors that creak, lived-in couches that tell stories about Amelia’s childhood, and a cookie jar in the kitchen that’s somehow always full. And she gives great hugs.

My grandmother lives in a sleek, modern high-rise right on the boardwalk in Long Beach with a wraparound balcony and a view of the ocean. She redecorates every three years, and she doesn’t knit me sweaters. (Though she does love taking me into Manhattan for back-to-school shopping every fall.) She doesn’t eat sugar or carbs, her best friends are two married gay men, and her condo smells like Chanel No. 5.

To be fair, she gives great hugs, too.

But sometimes I feel like I can never quite measure up. Not in the way my sister, Liv, did. Grandma Rose and Liv always had this special bond—from their love of the stage to their matching heart-shaped faces and deep blue eyes, to their overwhelming confidence that seemed to come so naturally for them but was nonexistent for me.

“Liv was the flirt, not me,” I told my grandmother.

She sighed. “Oh, sweetheart, I know that when I first came up with the idea of sending you to Europe to re-create the itinerary of my 1966 Paris album tour, we talked about you doing it with Liv when you graduated high school and she graduated college as a joint graduation gift. Ever since you two were little, I had planned to send you two to Europe. It’s what we always talked about. You know, if . . . Well, if she hadn’t . . .”

Grandma Rose looked down as she left her words hanging. But I didn’t need her to finish the sentence. I knew what she was going to say next: If your sister hadn’t died.

“But she did,” I said quietly. I took a deep breath.

With tears in her eyes, Grandma Rose said, “I know, my darling. I know.”

“I wish she were here.”

“I do, too,” Grandma Rose said. “Of course, the offer still stands. Just say the word and I’ll be on the next flight out, ready to join you.”

“I think I should do this on my own,” I said, not convinced of it even as I said the words.

“I think you should, too. And I think it’s going to be fabulous. Call me if you need me.”

I was determined to do it on my own. Sure, things had changed, but the idea of re-creating my grandmother’s famous tour was simply too enticing to pass up.

The Paris album was made in 1966. To this day, it funds my grandmother’s lifestyle. (And truth be told, it funds part of ours, too.) Its songs—which my grandmother and Dahlia jointly wrote—have been used in two major motion pictures and six different TV shows and have been sampled by three different rappers.

And it was during the recording of that album that my grandmother fell in love. A head-over-heels, crazy-insane sort of love. The type that burns so brightly that it could never last, despite how badly they’d both wanted it to. The type that was never replicated in her life again. (Apologies, Grandpa Harold.)

A server came over to my table, so I hung up my call and ordered a short stack of pancakes. Pancakes were the first food that Liv ever learned to cook on her own, and she would make them for me whenever I asked. Even after she taught me to make them (her secret was adding a sprinkle of nutmeg), I was convinced that the ones she made tasted better.

After ordering, my phone dinged with a text from my mom on the family group chat. My parents were the tiniest bit—how do I put this gently?—overprotective. But how could they not be, given what they’d gone through? So, I always did the right thing. I had to. What choice did I have? Ever since losing Liv, I’ve known how important my role in the family is. My parents don’t have to worry—they’ll never lose me like they lost Liv. I’m the consummate good girl.

MOM: Settling in okay?

ME: Everything’s great!

DAD: That’s great!

MOM: Love you! Miss you!

ME: Love you miss you

Typing miss you made my eyes tear up, so I clicked over to PennyForYourThoughts’s page. There was a picture with Penny in the center of the frame, her fingers up in a peace sign, and she’s surrounded by people.

Today’s tip: Make new friends, but keep the old.

I went to my best friend Amelia’s page. She had posted about her college move-in day. It looked equal parts fun and overwhelming. I liked the post and then commented with four hearts. She immediately responded with four hearts of her own and then DM’d me.

AMELIA: Sooooooo?

ME: So far, so good. Sort of.

AMELIA: Sort of is right. College is great, but scary

ME: Europe too.

AMELIA: We’ve got this.

Amelia’s right. We’ve got this.I may have had a rocky start, but my gap year is going to be great. I looked at my phone again, only to find that I had 10 percent battery left. Maybe I don’t got this? I silently cursed myself for not charging my phone when I had the chance in the hotel room (those backpacks are packed tight!). I needed to befriend someone who had a charger, stat.

Looking around the bar, I saw a redhead unplugging her phone from a charger. Without thinking, I immediately rushed over to ask if I could use her charger next. This must’ve been the first stages of jet lag, because I never act without overthinking, and I never (ever) approach strangers.

When she spun around to face me, it was like time stopped. She was the living embodiment of a boomerang video as her red hair spilled over her shoulders, as if in slow motion. I was momentarily stunned, and even more so when I realized that she was someone I knew.

Well, not knew knew. It would be more precise to say that I knew of her. With her long red hair and bright blue eyes, there was no mistaking her—she was PennyForYourThoughts, my favorite influencer.

I would play this cool, nonchalant. After all, they always say that celebrities want to be treated just like regular people.

“Ohmygodyourepennyforyourthoughts,” I said in a jumble. So

much for playing it cool.

“Hi, nice to meet you,” she said, with a wide smile. “Yes, I’m Penny.”

“I love you,” I said. What in the world?! “I mean, I follow you and you have great content.”

“That’s so sweet!” she replied. “Thank you for following me.”

“You are so welcome,” I said. “Would you mind if I borrowed your charger?”

“I thought you said you loved my account,” she said, with a sly smile on her lips. “If you really followed me, you’d know that the most important item in your bag is always your charger.”

“And a water bottle,” I chimed in. “I totally don’t have that, either.” Penny laughed. Her laughter was absolutely infectious, and I laughed back.

“I really do follow you,” I said. “This whole day has been a disaster, though. And I didn’t unpack a thing—my backpack is packed way too tightly! But that’s the least of my concerns. I thought I spoke perfect Spanish, and doing Spain on my own would be a breeze, but it turns out I don’t and it won’t. The guy at my hotel thought that I was so American that he sent me here. No offense.”

“None taken,” Penny said, still smiling widely. Penny had a beauty mark on her left cheek that I’d never noticed.

“I’m rambling, I’m sorry,” I said. “And here you are, with it all figured out.”

“I didn’t always,” she said, shrugging. “And I don’t necessarily. How long have you been in Madrid?”

“Today’s my first day.”

“It’s our first day in Madrid, too!” Penny said. “I’ve been with this group of people for almost two months now, but we just got to Madrid.”

“It’s my first day in Europe,” I clarified.

“Your first first day?” she asked incredulously. “Then you absolutely, positively must give yourself a break. You just got started!”

I didn’t respond, because she was right. I never gave myself a break.

I didn’t really know how to. That was how I became valedictorian of my class. That was how I got into Dartmouth. But maybe that was why I’d come here? Break the old patterns, learn some new ones. “Yeah. I did just get started.”

“Everyone knows that the best way to master a foreign language is to go out and party,” Penny said. “A group of us are going to hit the bars after we eat. You up for some fun?”