Saturday, June 18, 2016

Me Before You by JoJo Moyes Review!!

"Push yourself. Don't settle. Just live well. Just live."


Where can I even start with this review? Below is what I typed as my initial review on Goodreads as soon as I finished this book:

by 

15576819
's review 
Jun 17, 2016  ·  edit


Formal review to come. What I'll say for now: this book destroyed me and I am an ugly-crying, sniffling mess at present.








If you have not read this book, DO NOT READ THIS REVIEW! 

THERE WILL BE SPOILERS!


The above sentiment hasn't changed. I am writing this review, the next day, after completing the book. Maybe it's still too soon. Maybe it'll always be too soon. One thing I am glad of was seeing the sun come up this morning. I stayed up until the wee hours of the morning reading this, silently sobbing in bed as I read and my husband snored away. 



I don't really know how I feel about it. What I can say? JoJo Moyes is a fantastic author. She knows how to create characters that will stay with you for a long time. She is able to create such a strong emotional connection to a fictional story she created in her head and put down onto paper. Her story annihilated my heart but made compassion scream louder than any book I've read. This book will stay with me. I don't know if I'm emotionally stable enough to see the movie.




"You are scored on my heart, Clark. You were from the first day you walked in, with your ridiculous clothes and your complete inability to ever hide a single thing you felt."

I originally typed, "I don't know which character I loved more" but that's a lie. Will. Will is the character I loved more. I had a love/hate relationship with Louisa. She spent most of her life taking care of others, putting her needs last which I admire but also makes me want to shake her. I admire her helping to take care of her family. I don't admire her staying in a dead-end relationship because she didn't want more for herself and/or didn't think she could do better. Unfortunately, I think that is a reality for way too many people in our society and I don't like characters that encourage that passivity. 


Will helped her to see she can do better. She can do better in relationships. She can do better career-wise. She can do better in experience, laughter, love, and her future in general. Will would've been better. Will created a whole new world for her and she was happy to jump in. 

This isn't to say Will was perfect by any means. Sure, he was cranky and he was a playboy before his accident. But, the crankiness is understandable when you're constantly in pain and/or mourning the loss of a life you used to have. I am angry, but also can understand why the author did this to us. She developed this character (Will) that is really so easy to fall in love with. She got us to join in on Louisa's hope that she is making a difference, that maybe, just maybe, she'll be able to change his mind. There's one portion of the book that Nathan, or maybe even Will, tells Lou that she should've known better... she should've known she wouldn't be able to change his mind. And it did matter. Those six months MATTERED to Clark (Lou/Louisa) as much as they did to Will. 

"Time slowed, and stilled. It was just the two of us, me murmuring in the empty, sunlit room. Will didn't say much. He didn't answer back, or add a dry comment, or scoff. He nodded occasionally, his head pressed against mine, and murmured, or let out a small sound that could have been satisfaction at another good memory. "It has been the best six months of my entire life." "Funnily enough, Clark, mine too." And then, just like that, my heart broke. My face crumpled, my composure went and I held him tightly and I stopped caring that he could feel the shudder of my sobbing body because grief swamped me. It overwhelmed me and tore at my heart and my stomach and my head and it pulled me under, and I couldn't bear it."



Ugh. It wrecked me. This book, this story, just wrecked me. I'm not going to get into the politics of what happened and if it was ok, if it wasn't, etc. All I am going to say is that my heart hurts for Will and all he lost, as well as Louisa. There is always a silver lining, though and at least they found each other, even for just a short time. 


That's all for me, folks. I can't write/think/obsess over this story any more. I encourage you to read it. It will definitely remind you... to live. To embrace life. To strive for more. To feel. 




Tuesday, June 7, 2016

The Bookworm Box Review!

Y'all. Have you heard of The Bookworm Box?? If you have, you're a pretty smart cookie. If you haven't, you're still pretty smart because I know after reading this post you're going to be HOOKED! 💛

So, if you haven't noticed, this isn't going to be our typical book review post. Today, we were SO LUCKY to be chosen byThe  Bookworm Box to receive a free box in exchange for an honest review! We were so, so excited to be one of the chosen and cannot wait to share our joy for this fabulous, charitable organization!!

Speaking of charities... Each Bookworm Box you subscribe for/pay for, the proceeds go to charity. Each month, multiple charities receive funds from the Bookworm Box. One of the coolest things about that-- you can have a part in which charities receive those donations!! The Bookworm Box is constantly asking for your thoughts and suggestions for different charities and wanting your input. Where else are you going to find a place that wants you to have a say in where it's donations go??

Besides that cool piece of news, Colleen Hoover is the one who created this whole awesome empire. And if you don't know who Colleen Hoover is, well then... Bless your heart! You HAVE to read ALL of her books. Now. My suggestion is to start with Slammed 😍

Anyway, so now I've built up the hype and you're question might be- well what exactly is The Bookworm Box? Well, I'm happy to tell ya! It's a monthly subscription where you pay between $40-$50 (can't remember the exact number), but the proceeds go to charity and you receive TWO awesome, signed paperbacks by some pretty sweet authors and LOTS of book swag!

See below for our GA Bookaholics Bookworm Box: 


Pretty cool, right?! You receive some really special paperbacks that you'd ordinarily never have a chance to receive (especially because they are signed) and several other little surprise treats! It really helps you find new authors you may have never heard of, but all the authors of the books I have seen are still pretty popular. So, if I don't know about them yet, I'm usually pretty excited to learn about those (new to me) authors!

Anyway, because of my awesome Bookworm Box-- I've got some reading to do!! First on my list... Midnight Lily! ☺️