Recent Read : After You by Jojo Moyes | Thoughts

Hello Humans !!

I just finished reading After you by Jojo Moyes. Honestly, I am not very happy with it. Had it been a book on its own, I would have probably liked it better. The book simply does not match up to Me before You. I hate to admit that I found the sequel to be a bad idea. Nonetheless, Jojo is still my favourite author and I admire her writing.

So here are my thoughts about the sequel :

I was very disappointed that Louisa did not go to school or do any of the things I had anticipated. However, if she did everything as per my liking, it would have been too perfect. Jojo stuck to the character's personality and traits, which was hard to digest throughout the book. I wanted to punch Louisa in the face for many of the shitty decisions but then that only reminds us that people are who they are. You cannot really change them. As rightly said in the trailer of Me before You, you cannot change people, you only love them. I kept wondering if Sam really had to be in the picture? Like had he not been there, would Louisa have grown so much? Louisa's lack of ambitions was too much in focus. I can't stand unambitious people and it really bug me. However, I do understand her reluctance to leave Sam & Lily to shift to New York. Been there, felt that. Glad that she eventually went though, it slightly made up for my disappointment. 

Despite they way she is, I really liked Lily. The girl was in desperate need of genuine love and attention. I can totally empathise with her.

Louisa's mother seems to have grown more than any other character. I loved how she started attending classes and all. She is a lucky woman that her husband finally understood she was a person of her own and needed to do things for herself once in a while. Not sure every woman out there would eventually end up with such support. If only every man would learn from Bernard :p

Treena is my favourite. Not scared to say how she feels, always pushing her sister even if it does not work and extremely hard working in spite of her son. She battled through and made it. I was actually wishing that Louisa would adopt the same path as her.

Mr Traynor is an arsehole. In my opinion atleast. Felt very sad for Camilla.

There is an incident which I suppose was the climax of the book. It was totally unnecessary. Like what was the point? It lengthened the story is all. The plot could have done without it.

I tried my best to like the book. Unfortunately, it ruined the whole Me before You heaven I was in. Hopefully the movie will help me recover :p
The writing was impeccable though. For that I would rate After you with one star. Otherwise with the story line, I would not have given any.

Penning off,
BusLady 🚌