Throwback Thursday is a weekly meme created by book blogger extraordinaire, Renee at It’s Book Talk. She started this weekly feature as a way to highlight old favourites and read books that have already been published.
I have mentioned before that I belong to a book club that contains a group of teachers I have known since teacher’s college. We meet once a month, we discuss the book and we eat snacks. What more is there to want, ya know? This past month, after some careful deliberation, we decided to turn our attention to After I Do, by Taylor Jenkins Reid, since three of our book club members (including myself) are getting married this fall. What better way to prepare for marriage than to read a book about a marriage falling apart? We had some mixed feelings during our book club discussion and it became quite clear that this was either a “love it or hate it book”. Personally, I loved the book.
The novel opens with the introduction of Ryan and Lauren whose marriage has reached a breaking point; in an unconventional twist, they decide to take a year off of marriage in hopes of finding a way to fall back in love with each other. One year apart. One rule: they cannot contact each other.
The novel is narrated through the eyes of Lauren and as she embarks on this journey, she discovers more about herself and her family than she ever could have hoped. I felt like Lauren was extremely likeable and extremely relatable. The entire time I was reading, I kept thinking to myself how real it all felt. That could be because there was so much truth and honesty to the plot. Marriage is hard. Relationships are hard. And, sometimes, it’s the little things that become big things that end up being the deal breaker. I also loved that we were able to get an inside look into Lauren’s family (especially her grandma); they all become such welcome secondary characters and added so much to the plot.
This novel had the same easy reading style as the other Taylor Jenkins Reid books I have had the pleasure of reading but I loved the refreshing style of the narrative. This is not your typical chick-lit, rom-com type of story and I was so glad it didn’t read as such. I started this novel with the intention to read a chapter and get some other books completed but, once I started, I couldn’t put it down. It was binge read worthy.
My only desire was that we would have gotten full chapter perspectives from Ryan, I would have loved to know what he was up to during the story.
This book comes highly recommended from me.
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