Me Before You by Jojo Moyes

I must admit I have a hopeless romantic side. As such, I love reading love stories. A long time ago I read the back cover of Me Before You while wandering in the bookstore. I have a habit of just perusing and taking note of a book for later. I'm not being metaphorical here, I have a note created in my phone that is labeled "Books." When I find something I want to read but either do not have the money or the time to procure said book at that time I add it to the list for another date. So Me Before You goes on the list. And there is sits for several years. I ended up getting the book as a gift later on and it still sat waiting for me to get to it.

Fast forward a bit to June 2016 and I find myself FINALLY getting around to reading the book. I was wasting all that time leaving that book to sit. It was such a good book. I've made note that there is a second book, to which I'm excited and a bit befuddled-as the end of the book leaves little room to continue on. As such, I cannot wait to get to reading that book and finding out what Moyes can do with the sequel.

I like the development of the characters and how this is not your typical love story. Lou Clark has worked one job all her life. She has not real aspirations to go anywhere or do anything outside of her mundane life. She has a boyfriend, Patrick, who is very...familiar. Lou takes a job as a caregiver for Will Traynor, a socialite adventurer who has an accident and gets spinal cord injury that has left him paralyzed. The nature of her job is not desired by Will and he does his best to make her go away.

Lou finds out more about Will and makes it her mission to help him out of his depressive state. She enlists the help of Nathan, Will's nurse, and they set out on adventures that end up helping Lou along on her journey to self discovery more than anything else. Lou and Will teach each other so many crucial aspects of life. And they do this all within the 6 month deadline that has been set for her.

The book touches on issue such as quality vs quantity of life and doctor assisted suicide. It shows the types of support systems people in Will's condition can have available to them. As someone with a nursing background I found the medical aspect of the book to be spot on but not overwhelming or overshadowing to the storyline.

This story is frustrating, humorous, cute, thought provoking, and heart-wrenching. It's a good read that so many can appreciate.

Happy reading!

Judi