You, with a View

This book is easily a new favorite of mine. I will say, the first couple of chapters start slow, but if you hang on, it soon becomes a magical adventure about family, love, grief, secrets, failure, and passion (the career kind). It has a little bit of everything. It all starts with a great premise: Going through the belongings of her grandmother who recently passed, Noelle finds photos of her grandmother with a guy who was clearly not her grandfather. Intrigued but unsure of where to start, she calls on social media to help her out and, lo and behold, the grandson of the mystery man contacts her! Excited to learn more about her grandmother, she rushes to meet them both…only to find out that the grandson is her nemesis from high school who is now uber successful while she moved back with her parents. What ensues from there is essentially “Letters from Juliet” but WAY better.

While it may start out as the perfect romance book of enemies to lovers (which more on that later ;P), this book goes in deep on the hard topics. It covers grief and how to deal with a loved one even after everyone else seems to have moved on. It deals with feeling like a failure when you used to be on top of the world. It deals with finding your passion in life and learning to be be brave enough to follow it. It deals with the importance of relationships to help you through the hard times as well as the good. This book was so touching, and I don’t think I’ll be able to forget it anytime soon.

While it is hard to pick the best part, I truly believe that the characters are the star of the show. Noelle is so relatable as the main character. She’s open but feisty. Paul is also such a sweetheart that you instantly love. I mean who doesn’t like the old man who was willing to go on a 2-week hiking trip just to bring Noelle some closure?? And then you have Theo, who knows just how to push Noelle’s buttons while also being endlessly charming. Its the perfect mix of characters.

The romance was also really well done. It wasn’t overshadowed by the story of Noelle learning more about her grandmother. Noelle and Theo had such good banter and chemistry that I was instantly rooting for them. They also were really mature in how they handled things. I won’t give any spoilers, but I never felt like I wanted to shove my head through a wall which is a huge plus.

I could talk about this book for ages, but it would all boil down to the same thing: This book is awesome. GO READ IT!! Seriously. You won’t regret it.