{Me Before You by Jojo Moyes}
I’ve been off my fiction reading game for a bit (I feel like I went through a non-fiction phase recently), and this is the first book I’ve read in a while that I felt fully captivated by the story. Louisa is an average girl in a small English town (with a castle), who goes to work for Will, a paraplegic who is bitter about life. She wants to convince him that life is worth living, but it turns out she has a lot to learn about living life, too. Me Before You is an easy read (although I felt it was a bit long-winded in some places), and while I wouldn’t recommend it to everyone, I can see why it’s been such a hit recently.
{The Fringe Hours: Making Time For You by Jessica Turner}
This is a book I needed badly, because in the chaos of each day (and especially days of motherhood now), it feels almost impossible to find time for myself. The Fringe Hours not only encourages you to do that, it tells you why it’s so important for everyone in your life (not just you) and makes you think about ways you can make time for yourself happen. While the writing style of this book wasn’t my favorite (it felt a bit dry and didactic in some places), the encouragement for women to make yourself a priority, even when everyone else in your life seems to need something from you, hit close to home.
{Seating Arrangements by Maggie Shipstead}
The Van Meter eldest daughter is getting married on an island in Maine, the younger sister is recovering from a broken heart, the father is having a bit of a personal crisis, and the bridesmaids are causing all kinds of trouble. It’s a book that sounds like good fun, but it is serious under the surface. It is one of those books where nothing particular happens, but tension simmers low and slow. I really loved this book. It’s the kind of book that’s written slow so that you can savor it (Maggie Shipstead is a masterful writer), but you keep turning the pages with anticipation. I wouldn’t recommend it to everyone (while it is about a wedding, it is not a light-hearted book), but I personally adored it.
{What Alice Forgot by Liane Moriarty}
This is a book I will be recommending to everyone. My mom is already borrowing my copy, and I have promised to pass it along to my mother-in-law next. When Alice wakes up on the gym floor, she slowly realizes she has lost ten years of her memory and can’t figure out why she is getting a divorce or who her children are or why she has become the kind of mom that seems a bit…tense. What Alice Forgot is great fun, but it is also poignant–the kind of book that makes you reflect on your own life and what has changed in the past ten years and if you’ve become the kind of person you hoped you’d be.
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