After You (Me Before You #2)

After You by Jojo Moyes is the second book in her series, Me Before You . This is the story of Louisa Clark and her life AFTER Will Traynor. It is refreshingly nowhere near as heartbreaking as as it’s predecessor, Me Before You, and picks up after Lou’s time in Paris AFTER Switzerland and (view spoiler).

The book quite literally begins with a bang (or crash?) with Louisa taking a bad fall and being collected by the paramedics. Intense and sad when we see just how (view spoiler). Once she is out of the hospital her parents insist she go to a support group for grieving people and she reluctantly agrees. Then, a teenager named Lily shows up on her doorstep with a surprising revelation and Louisa’s life is embroiled in Lily’s teenage drama. Then, she meets the paramedic that helped piece her back together after her fall and finds him just as wonderful as he was the night he saved her. Things are slowly turning around for Lou and she doesn’t feel like she is letting Will down as much. But this is just the calm before the storm and while she tries to move on with Sam, can he deal with hr still painfully mourning Will? Can Lily ever get ehr head around her family issues and can Lou help her or is she just a punching bag for this hormonal teen with, rightly so, abandonment issues.

People looking for another heartbreak like Me Before You will be sorely disappointed. This is Lou’s life moving on from that epic romance/tragedy. Why anyone would want to put her through something like losing Will a second time is beyond me. The story is intriguing and entertaining and no less Louisa Clark than the first book but it is MUCH more lighthearted (in comparison). Up next, Still Me. Enjoy!

When I found out that Me Before You was getting a sequel, I was extremely hesitant. It was such a strong book that I was unsure if a sequel would add to it or take away from it. These were characters that I had developed a love for and I didn’t want my memories of them to potentially be tarnished. Think about it. The reader grows attached to the characters. One wrong move and you altar their preception of that character and not necessarily in a good way. That being said, I did wonder how Lou was doing after the events of Me Before You. Tricky business, sequels are. Very very tricky.

I wish that I could say that I went into this book with a totally open mind but I find that impossible to do. I did not go into with a completely open mind because I was so invested in the story. The first book was so extraordinary that it set this one up to potentially fall on its face. Unfortuantely, in some ways, it did. It was nice to see how Lou was doing but some of the events completely came out of left field and I was not quite sure how to process them. Good character development for some and so so for others.

I am rating this book Three Stars because it fell short but I did not hate it. Predictable in some ways. Random in others. Upon finishing it, I hoped that any future books in the series would bypass this one. I wish that I could rate it higher because I loved Me Before You so much but I cannot. Not a horrible read but not up to the standards that the author gave us in the previous book. On the fence about recommending.

InkedBookDragon

I loved this book just as much as I loved the first one “Me Before You”. This is Louisa’s life after Will and I thought it was very true to her character, especially in how long it takes her to finally move on with her life. She is lost without him and it shows in her choices of job, clothing, recreation. When life keeps trying to get her to move on, she fights it as hard as she can as she doesn’t want to have a fulfilling life without Will.

I hope there is another Louisa novel in the works as I’ve grown quite attached to her.

I liked After You by JoJo Moyes, but it wasn’t memorable like the first extraordinary book in the series, Me Before You. It was an entertaining novel, but fell short of the emotional impact created by Me Before You.

Louisa Clark returns, still so likable but struggling through the stages of grief since the passing of Will Traynor. With the help of quirky friends from her group therapy session, called The Moving on Circle, a teenage girl, named Lily, a new love interest, Sam, and her comical but loving family, Louisa begins to recover and starts experiencing life again.

JoJo Moyes is an exceptional writer. Her books tackle substantial subjects in the best of ways. Reading one of her books is an emotional catharsis. You’ll laugh out loud one minute and sob the next. They are equally as successful for a book discussion as they are to read at the beach. But, when an author decides to write a sequel to a book like Me Before You, expectations are incredibly high, and the follow up story needs to pack the punch of the first. This one unfortunately did not. Most sequels don’t live up to the original, and though I don’t object to this one, it did not need to be written. Some stories are so special that it is best to leave them alone. They are perfect as told and satisfyingly complete. Me Before You was one of those novels. 3 1/2 stars.

The aftermath. That is what I thought of this book. I loved the first one, and I just new that I couldn’t or wouldn’t love this one as much. That was true and it wasn’t. I enjoyed how life wasn’t just peachy for Lou, how we heard about her struggles and fears. The pain and anger. It was all so real. There were times when I wanted her to just snap out of it, but then you remember what she lost, and the way in which she lost it. Grief has no directions or timetables. It takes and takes, and very rarely, and slowly does it begin to give back. I wasn’t expecting Lily, I was caught off guard with that surprise, but it wove into the story seamlessly. Sam was also quite wonderful. Well written book, and honest. It made me miss and want to love and hurt Will all over again.

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