I love Cecelia Ahern. This all started back in 2005 when I picked up one of her books during an international relocation, and found something funny and lovely – just what I needed to entertain myself in a country in which I didn’t understand the language. Of course it was a love story – I’d be surprised if you expected anything else from me.
Having enjoyed Where Rainbows End, I immediately looked for more of her books. I haven’t read all of them, but each one I’ve read has touched me. This is another one of those.
Kitty has had a major setback, and based off of the description of what she’s done, she deserves it. Constance, her mentor, seems like someone who has provided Kitty quite a bit of guidance over their relationship (more than expected over the 10 years they’ve known each other). If she’d been my mentor, I have a feeling I’d be a little annoyed by her, but she seemed to gel with Kitty. Kitty’s setback leads her to Constance’s idea for her last story, and it takes her a while to figure out what exactly Constance wanted to do with the list of names she left behind.
As she’s finding her way, she’s given a wakeup call by her friend Steve that I wish she would have taken to heart a lot earlier in the book, because she continues to be pretty selfish and shallow for a lot longer than I wanted her to be. It took me a lot longer to get into the book than I expected. Right around the 50% mark, I was curious if I’d be able to make it to the end without skimming. (Looking back, I think that’s what happens when I read Ahern’s non-romance driven books.) Through Kitty’s exploration of the names and the stories behind all of them I finally connected with the story, and I loved it. I’ll leave you with one of my favorite quotes from the book:
“Every single ordinary person has an extraordinary story. We might all think that we are unremarkable, that our lives are boring, just because we aren’t doing ground-breaking things or making headlines or winning awards. But the truth is we all do something that is fascinating, that is brave, that is something we should be proud of. Every day people do things that are not celebrated. That is what we should be writing about. The unsung heroes, the people that don’t believe they are heroes at all because they are just doing what they believe they have to do in their lives.”