Warning: Spoilers! (duh.)
Lou Clark knows lots of things. She knows how many footsteps there are between the bus stop and home. She knows she likes working in The Buttered Bun tea shop and she knows she might not love her boyfriend Patrick.
What Lou doesn't know is she's about to lose her job or that knowing what's coming is what keeps her sane.
Will Traynor knows his motorcycle accident took away his desire to live. He knows everything feels very small and rather joyless now and he knows exactly how he's going to put a stop to that.
What Will doesn't know is that Lou is about to burst into his world in a riot of colour. And neither of them knows they're going to change the other for all time.
Me Before You by Jojo Moyes
Published December 31st 2012 by Pamela Dorman Books/Viking
Hardcover, 481 pages
Me Before You is set in the English countryside, Yorkshire I assume. I'm from Cumbria so this is like
next door to me and that makes me really happy. Moyes got the setting built really well as I live and have
been to these types of villages many times. That and the fact the protagonist is named Lou (I'm a Lou)
pulled me in immediately. What a shame I didn't like Lou that much - but I'll get to that.
Immediately Lou loses her job. She lives with her family who are a bit hard done for, so the loss of money is
a definite blow. She tries working at a few jobs that are gruesome or terrible until finally, she falls into being
a caregiver for Will. Will has Quadriplegia meaning he is mostly paralysed from the chest down, with a little
bit of movement in his arm. There relationship is pretty rocky to say the least until a mutual attraction forms.
They fall in love it's gushy and romantic and cute - but then we have this underlying issue. Will wants to die.
Will promised his parents 6 months to change his mind and if not he would be going to Dignitas to end his life.
Naturally this is a huge aspect of the book and has caused a lot of controversy. People seem to be concerned that
what Moyes is saying is that Will's life is meaningless now, that he is disabled so he wants to die because he thinks
his life is never going to be good enough. I disagree, personally I never got that reading of it. What I understood
from the book was that Will is a rich boy, he has probably never had to want for anything in his life and I imagine
when that's the case and to want for something so simple that you can never have -that has to be so hard. I don't think
Will as a person, from the way he was raised or whatever, is not equipped to look on the bright side.
I won't touch on euthanasia much but for me, the story was not saying all disabled people want to die. For me it
was about Will as a person rather than a man with quadriplegia. I think Will does not accept second best, even if
that second best is a happy life with Lou, and that is ultimately the tragedy of this book. When she lays it all out on the
beach, telling her she loves him and she can make him happy and he still says no. That was hard to read, it felt so final.
Lou at first really bugged me. I found her very childish, rather annoying and it was a struggle to push through until we
met Will - who was hilarious, charming and complicated. It's just every two seconds I wanted to shake her around and
give her a kick up the arse. She was so hard to get through too, but once Will did she became this whole new person.
Confident and actually honest with herself because I knew very early on that Patrick was awful, they were terrible together,
they barely got on and when she moved in with him it was just so awkward. She spent most of the book going through the
motions of what she thinks she should be doing and it was great to see Will knock some sense in to her.
The romance really was not as big of a part of this novel as it was advertised but that is fine by me. It was steady and real
and slow and I liked that. Moyes did not create insta-love or have her checking him out as he wheeled into the room -she let
the characters do it, almost to the point where you barely notice the change- it was some stunning writing.
That final scene in Dignitas, when they know it's about to happen and she rushes there to see him - BEAUTIFUL. I almost
couldn't believe it was happening it was so awful but it was also just so great. I would have to say this book got better as it
went along. The more we learned about both these characters, the more they reached out of the page and slapped me with
emotion. I think it is a damn fine book, but if I have to read Patrick running one more time - I will throw it at the wall.
I hope this helps, let me know what you thought of the book (or the movie).
Happy Reading.
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