“Well, that’s growing up, isn’t it? You don’t always have to know. And things aren’t always fair. You just have to keep moving forward. A step in one direction.”
My eyes are still a bit moist from tears of both pain and joy after reading the last few chapters of the book. And Wow! Just…I totally didn’t expect to experience a whirl of emotions over this book. Don’t get me wrong. This isn’t a heavy, dramatic read. In fact, even though there ARE heavy and serious themes, the author managed to magically approach the entire story in such a lighthearted manner. It’s seriously impressive!
And yet for me, it was still an emotion filled story which I was completely clueless about because check out that title, it’s just Emily & Oliver. What complicated emotion could possibly emanate from it?! Guess I’m wrong (as usual) because although the book does have romance, it isn’t really a romantic teen-flick as one might innocently deduce from the title, not at all.
It’s about so many truthful, relatable things like realistic depictions of growing up, of losing someone you love, the feeling of alienation versus belongingness, the necessity of friendship in all stages of a person’s life and the process by which the smallest but most complex social unit operates-I’m referring to family.
It all felt so real and I was fully connected to the entire story and every single one of the character who are all completely fleshed out and very relatable. I also loved how Ms. Robin Benway put so much effort in making her writing not only appealing, current, very funny too, but also highly sensitive to various kinds of readers and I wholeheartedly recommend this to everyone.
