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 colour. And neither of them knows they're going to change the other for all time.
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 colour. And neither of them knows they're going to change the other for all time.
The literary world seems to have just blown up because of this book. Everyone is just tripping over themselves to shove it into someone's hand. That's a great thing. I'm all for getting non-readers to pick up a book and this book has accomplished that. But I'm also all for a book that can stand up to the hype for me. This one just didn't. And I wish that it had.
I didn't know what to expect when picking this book up. Well, that's not true. From what everyone was saying, I expected to fall in love with this book and just bawl my eyes out. I didn't on either account. After I finished the last page, I just felt ... nothing. I immediately went online to check out Goodreads to see what all of my friends had thought. I read review after review from people that just adored Me Before You. They all said something about crying and needing a box of tissues and I'm sitting over here, dry-eyed and irritated.
I started this book with a hopeful heart. I was hoping for an earth-shattering reading experience. But what I actually got was a very slow first half of the book. I had to force myself to go to the next page. Now, some books are just like that ... they take a while to set everything up and then BAM! you find yourself in the middle of the best read of the year. This wasn't one of those books. I kept reading hoping that something would click. That something would make me say, "WOW! This is why..." but that didn't happen. It felt like I was chasing a mirage the whole time.
Basically, I ended up feeling like a heartless witch when I finally reached the ending. I didn't cry, not one tear. I didn't have the urge to cry and I feel pretty horrible. Did I miss something? Am I just completely uncaring since I couldn't cry at the absolutely earth-shattering situations these poor characters are going through? I have no heart. That has to be it.
All of that being said, the book was really well written. The characters had a depth that most authors strive for and the story wasn't missing any detail that I wish that I had had while reading. I just didn't connect with it. I understood the plight of the characters but I had absolutely no attachment to any of them. I wanted to love this one. Maybe I would have if I wasn't so obviously dead inside.
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