Sonntag, 28. Februar 2016

Review: The Girl You Left Behind by Jojo Moyes

17572903Plot

In 1916, French artist Edouard Lefevre leaves his wife Sophie to fight at the Front. When her town falls into German hands, his portrait of Sophie stirs the heart of the local Kommandant and causes her to risk everything - her family, reputation and life—in the hope of seeing her true love one last time.

Nearly a century later and Sophie's portrait is given to Liv by her young husband shortly before his sudden death. Its beauty speaks of their short life together, but when the painting's dark and passion-torn history is revealed, Liv discovers that the first spark of love she has felt since she lost him is threatened...


My thoughts

This book was recommended to me by my sister, because she is a huge fan of Jojo Moyes. She said I would enjoy the book because it has a historical aspect to it, so I gave it a go, although this isn't my genre at all. But oh boy, am I glad that I read this!
The list of things I liked and disliked worked so well last time, so I'm going to do the same now:

Things I loved: 
The characters in the past. It took me exactly 10 pages to get attached to these characters and live in their world. We had ups and downs together, and I just felt like I was a part of it. It felt like I was in the story, because I liked the characters so much. One specific character seemed very interesting to me, and that was the Commander. I would have loved to read about his feelings and private life too! But still, I care for these characters so much, and I am not ready yet to let Sophie and Edouard go.

The writing. This kind of goes hand in hand with the characters, because they were just described perfectly, but also the world building was fantastic! The writing flowed so nicely with the rest of the story, so that you just kept reading and reading, not even realising that the book was almost finished. I am defnitely looking forward to reading more by this author!

The ending. I thought I already know how it is going to end, but oh man was I wrong. In a good way. I was prepared for pain and tears, and these things did occur, but in a different way than I expected, which was fantastic! When I closed the book I was overall just so satisfied with this book, the story, the ending, everything.

Things I didn't like so much: 
The plot (at some points). Although the whole book went by very fast, the middle part was kind of slow for me. The change of perspective was very sudden, so that I needed a few chapters to get adjusted to what's happening now. After that however, the changes were not as aprupt anymore, so I had more time to get used to the other people, which was great.

The characters in the present. Whilst I really just adored every character in the past section, the characters in the present weren't so great for me. I didn't like anyone in particular, and the romance between the two characters here was kind of ... I don't know how to describe it ... not really working for me? One of my biggest pet peeves is when characters miscommunicate or something, and I felt like this happened here sometimes. Other than that though, I was pretty satisfied with how everything turned out in the present too.


Conclusion:
Also if this book isn't your genre, please check it out! It is definitely worth a read!

Rating:

4.5 / 5 

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