Me Before You – Jojo Moyes
*Warning – may contain spoilers*
Author: Jojo Moyes
Publisher: Penguin
Books
First published: 2012
Cover: Paperback
Pages: 481
Blurb: 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.
History of my copy: I got this book last
Friday at Tesco for only £2.85, as I used a World Book Day token. I also bought
Our Endless Numbered Days and In the Heart of the Sea.
Perhaps I should mention right now that I’m not a fan of
romance books. Sure, like most teenage girls, I do love an adorable couple but
I need a story that doesn’t revolve around that. I knew from the start that Me Before You was not my kind of book,
but its huge popularity made me give in and give it a go.
Oh how I regret that. I naively believed that there would be
something more to this book, but I was wrong. I think people are selfish, and
love is overrated, and true love certainly doesn’t exist so this entire book
just seemed so fake and forced to me.
Plot: The majority of this book takes
place over a six-month period in which Louisa Clark, bubbly, stuck-in-a-rut
girl takes a job caring for Will Traynor, ex-businessman who is now a
quadriplegic. She later discovers that she Will is going to end his own life,
and she begins planning adventures to get him to change his mind. Of course, as
these kinds of books always go, she falls in love with him. And, shock horror
SPOILER ALERT (although is it really a spoiler when I saw it a mile off?) she
fails. I now feel like I have just wasted hours reading a book that nothing
really happens in.
Setting: Perhaps the one redeeming
factor of this book is its settings. Moyes has done her research regarding
quads and their needs. The places that Will, Lou and sometimes medical helper
Nathan go to, are unique, interesting and seriously? I’m surprised they didn’t
change Will’s mind. Even just the generic countryside was made to feel something
a little special.
Characters: Cliché doesn’t begin to sum
up all the characters in this book. None of them felt particularly different to
what I’ve seen before, and I didn’t feel attached to any of them. Apart from perhaps
Katrina because hey, it’s rare I see my name in a book okay?
First we have Will’s family and
friends: the father, who is having an affair; the mother, who is all business
and worry; Will who is the typical difficult bloke, despite his disability;
Will’s sister, who is barely even mentioned. Oh, and let’s not forget that Will’s
ex ends up marrying his best friend. Wow, I’ve never seen any of this before!
Now for Lou’s family: the
father, who gets made redundant; the grandfather who has had a stroke; the
mother who just looks after everyone; the sister and her son, who is a polar opposite
of Lou; Lou herself who just feels like her ‘differences’ are forced. Oh, and
she has been raped, haven’t seen that in a main female character’s history
before! And then there is her boyfriend, who is so dull it hurts.
The characters just feel like
every other generic book, altered just a little to fit the plot. Yawn.
To read or not to
read: Really don’t bother. I was
highly disappointed by this book, and all that made me finish it was that I
wanted to be done with it before Lady Midnight arrived. Sure, it was okay, just
so generic and predictable. In fact, the preview of After You had me more
hooked than the entire of Me Before You.
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