Monthly TBR: March

Review: Me before You by JoJo Moyes

Me before You by JoJo Moyes

Published: December 31, 2012

Publisher: Pamela Dorman/Viking

Rating: 5/5

Synopsis

Lou Clark knows lots of things. She knows how many footsteps there are between the bus stop and home. She knows she likes working in The Buttered Bun tea shop and she knows she might not love her boyfriend Patrick.

What Lou doesn't know is she's about to lose her job or that knowing what's coming is what keeps her sane.

Will Traynor knows his motorcycle accident took away his desire to live. He knows everything feels very small and rather joyless now and he knows exactly how he's going to put a stop to that.

What Will doesn't know is that Lou is about to burst into his world in a riot of color. And neither of them knows they're going to change the other for all time.

My Thoughts

This is the most gut wrenching and beautiful thing I’ve read in a long time. This is the story of Will who has everything happening for him, he is living the most amazing life but all that comes to an end one day when he is involved in an accident. His fast pace carefree life is gone when he is left paralyze and now he thinks he has nothing to live for.

Lou is a quirky girl who lives at home with her crazy family and is searching for a job when she gets a job being Will’s caretaker/companion. When she first meets Will he is depressed and withdrawn and doesn’t want anyone or anything anymore. In time Lou is determined to make Will come out of his shell and want to enjoy life again. She wants to show him he can enjoy some of the things he loved in the past just in a different way.

During the course of a few months Will and Lou form a bond that is unbreakable and maybe have even fallen in love. But when Lou discovers the real reason she was hired it breaks her heart. Will’s intentions while heartbreaking sends Lou’s life in a tail spin, she loves him too much to stand by and accept it but on the flip side she loves and cares for him too much to not accept his wishes.

What I love so much about this book was how it was just so beautifully heartbreaking. It begs us to ask ourselves if we love someone do we accept something we find so outrageous for their benefit or can we really stand ground in our own beliefs? In the end I went with the simple notion that love does conquer all. When you love someone you will do whatever they want over your own wants. This is one book that will touch your soul like no other and one that demands to be devoured like the sweet treat it is.

Review + Giveaway: One Plus One by JoJo Moyes

One Plus One by JoJo Moyes

Published: March 31, 2015

Publisher: Penguin

Format: paperback via publisher

Rating: 4/5

Synopsis

Suppose your life sucks—a lot. Your husband has done a vanishing act, your teenage stepson is being bullied, and your math whiz daughter has a once-in-a-lifetime opportunity that you can’t afford to pay for. If you’re Jess Thomas, you do what you always do—make it work.

Jess and her family (including their giant, smelly dog Norman) begin their doomed-from-the-start adventure stranded on the side of the road next to a dilapidated Rolls Royce—sans license, sans insurance—having just been pulled over by the police for a missing headlight. And the unexpected knight in shining armor who rescues them? Geeky Ed, the obnoxious tech millionaire whose vacation home Jess happens to clean. With big problems of his own, Ed, in perhaps his first ever unselfish act, offers to drive Jess and her dysfunctional brood to the Maths Olympiad and a prize that could turn everything around for Jess’s family.

This unlikely cast of characters is easy to fall for: Nicky, Jess’s stepson, wears mascara, doesn’t fit in at school, but is fiercely protective of Tanzie, Jess’s precocious math prodigy daughter; Jess and Ed are the kind of opposites you love to watch attract; and pungent Norman, the immovable mascot of the back seat, is the best guard dog you’ll ever find drooling on your shoulder.

**GIVEAWAY**

 In celebration of One Plus One on paperback I'm honored to offer [1] paperback copy to a lucky reader.

Simply click HERE to enter! Good luck! U.S. Only

 About the Author

JOJO MOYES is the New York Times bestselling author of One Plus One, The Girl You Left Behind, Me Before You, and The Last Letter from Your Lover.  She is also the author of the e-only novella Honeymoon in Paris as well as Silver Bay and The Ship of Brides, recently out in paperback. Moyes also writes for a variety of newspapers and magazines. She lives with her husband and their three children on a farm in Essex, England.

Also published by Viking / Penguin and available as ebooks:

Me Before You / Penguin / $16.00 / ISBN: 978-0-14-312454-2

The Last Letter from Your Lover / Penguin / $16.00 / ISBN: 978-0-14-312110-7

The Girl You Left Behind / Penguin / $16.00 / 978-0-14-312577-8

Silver Bay / Penguin / $16.00 / ISBN: 978-0-14-312648-5

The Ship of Brides / Penguin / $16.00 / ISBN: 978-0-14-312647-8

Honeymoon in Paris (e-book only) / Pamela Dorman Books-Viking / ISBN: 978-0-698-14432-3

My Thoughts

What can I say I’m officially a fan! Why on earth did it take me so long to read a JoJo Moyes book?? Now that I’ve read this one I will make it my mission to go and seek out every book she has ever written that’s how much I love and adore her and her writing.

I loved Jess from the start as a woman who is simply trying to hold on her to family while everything around her is falling apart. She is left to provide for her family when her husband all but disappeared leaving her with a daughter and step son to care for. Her daughter Tanzie is a math whiz and has been invited to Maths Olympiad and the money could change a lot of things. Enter Ed whom Jess cleans for and due to circumstances they end up road trip buddies. Ed is the complete opposite of Jess in so many aspects. He is well to do, rich but in so many ways out of touch. He has in essences almost built this whole world around himself so that he doesn’t have to deal with the real world. You almost feel sorry for the guy. I became so protected of these characters that can't help but fall in love with flaws and all.

Personally the road trip was the best part of the book for me. That’s when I feel we really got to know each of these characters the good and the bad. For some reason the open road was like therapy and was just what each of them needed at this time of their lives. I love how sometimes we have to hit bottom in our lives in order to truly enjoy the good things in life, not to mention to truly appreciate them. JoJo Moyes has a way of bringing all these characters that on the surface may seem like complete opposites but beneath the surface might be more alike than they seem. I love how we see these people evolve over time and while that can be hard at times in the end is wonderful.