Me Before You by Jojo Moyes (book review by Efterpi)

Author: Jojo Moyes
Release Date: December 31st 2012
Publisher: Pamela Dorman books/Viking
Pages: 369
Rating: 5 stars
Buy on: Amazon

 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.

Review:

Once I read the first two pages of the book I immediately understood that this will be a hard book to judge, it is nothing like the books I read before but it is so beautiful and sad and a huge tear jerker.
It starts with a small background story that initially a lot of us may not understand and it moves on in the present with Lou.

An ordinary woman in her mid 20's. A woman with no real interests and no adventurous life but with a scary experience behind her. When Lou loses her job because of the financial crisis she is over herself because her family has it hard. She knows that there is no way that she will find a decent job in order to support herself and her family and she seems to lose hope when she visits the unemployment office the only available job for her is as a carer for a quadriplegic man. She has no experience over this but then again she doesnt have experience in anything at all its the money that she needs and the pay is good that motivate her to go in for the interview.

Once she is hired she comes face to face with Will. A 35 year old man in a wheel chair unable to move from his chest and down. An ex businessman, he used to be encircled by fame, women sex and luxury and now he is being Lou's nightmare on a wheel chair. She is uncomfortable being around him he is making her life a living hell with his attitude and here starts adventure.

While the book moves on we start to see the real reason Will is treating Lou like that. That he is fighting for his right to have a say in his life now that his mother wants to control most of it out of fear that he will attempt suicide. Now that he is unable to take control of his own life by himself, that he constantly needs someone there to help him with everything. Deep inside we see a man thinking of his amazing and adventurous past and comparing it to the dull and full with misery future that expects him. He simply didnt chose this life for himself. Here we experience the great writing of the author. Although the perspective is from Lou;s point of view we get to know Will a lot better.

We get to see Lou getting attracted to him as he is being a little nicer to him, how she tries to cheer him and actually change her life for the best because of him. How she doing a great research on quadriplegics and the effort she puts in making Will's life easier. But to all that there is a reason.

Some of you may be little reluctant when it comes to the subject of the book. Its a really complicated story that evolves in a love story and how a small decision can change your life for ever. We see how a person can change who you are in a matter of a few months. That was the most beautiful part of the book , how I, the reader got to bond with Will and Lou. Their personalities are so alive, so full of life that I laughed and cried with them. They made me see things from a different perspective.
Moyes does not preach or judge of anyones ethics and decisions and she is really going through the stages of life and how an accident can change you. She gives some interesting perspectives on subjects but still she is letting the reader decide what to believe and what to judge. For me this is amazing storytelling.

I will definitely come back to this book again one day. In my opinion this is a book for those who like books that make you think , books that make you cry and books that the ending always leaves a taste bittersweet and for a lot of thought. Definitely worthed it.