Review: Dear Emmie Blue

Oh, Emmie. You randomly came across my reading pile and quickly found your way into my heart. The cover of Lia Louis's second novel was what originally caught my eye but then one of my favourite authors mentioned she had read, and loved, Dear Emmie Blue. I figured, what the heck. I'd request it from NetGalley and see what it was like. And oh my word, I fell head over heels for this story. It was a surprise, not that it was great, exactly, but that I was so completely, totally in love.

Here's the synopsis:

At sixteen, Emmie Blue stood in the fields of her school and released a red balloon into the sky. Attached was her name, her email address…and a secret she desperately wanted to be free of. Weeks later, on a beach in France, Lucas Moreau discovered the balloon and immediately emailed the attached addressed, sparking an intense friendship between the two teens.

Now, fourteen years later, Emmie is hiding the fact that she’s desperately in love with Lucas. She has pinned all her hopes on him and waits patiently for him to finally admit that she’s the one for him. So dedicated to her love for Lucas, Emmie has all but neglected her life outside of this relationship—she’s given up the search for her absentee father, no longer tries to build bridges with her distant mother, and lives as a lodger to an old lady she barely knows after being laid off from her job. And when Lucas tells Emmie he has a big question to ask her, she’s convinced this is the moment he’ll reveal his feelings for her. But nothing in life ever quite goes as planned, does it?

Emmie Blue is about to learn everything she thinks she knows about life (and love) is just that: what she thinks she knows. Is there such thing as meant to be? Or is it true when they say that life is what happens when you are busy making other plans?

Emmie is a huge reason why I loved this book. She's just turning 30 when we meet her (as is Lucas - they share a birthday) and feels like she should have her life more "together" than it is. That is something I most definitely can relate to. Sometimes I'm still surprised that I'm supposed to be a real adult. She also has a lot of pain in her past, especially from when she was a teen, that she's never really dealt with. Until she realizes she has to work through what happened to her, she can't quite move on and isn't aware of some of the really wonderful things, and people, in her life.

You may think that it would be frustrating for the reader when it's so clear that Emmie needs to face her past head on so she can move forward. That she's putting walls up and not fully allowing people in who the reader can see would be so good for her. I wasn't frustrated. I actually felt some of the pain right along with Emmie and was surprised at how emotional I was getting while reading the book. Louis makes the reader feel all the feels with this novel so be prepared. It's hard sometimes but it's part of what makes this book so magical.

When I first started the book, it reminded me a lot of the movie Love, Rosie which is based on Cecelia Ahern's novel Where Rainbows End. This was a rare case of not having read the book before the movie so I don't know how much was changed in the adaptation, but the similarities between this book and the movie were strong. The storylines eventually diverged and become more dissimilar as time went on but the feeling I was left with after finishing both Dear Emmie Blue and Love, Rosie was really similar and I was glad to have found another story that made my heart warm (after making it hurt). 

While the majority of the novel's plot is about family, friends, and professional issues, a good chunk of it is also about a romance. Emmie's realized she's completely hung up on Lucas, who she's known for 14 years. Like, full blown, hopelessly devoted in love with him. The reader has a clearer view than Emmie of how the romance should play out and I was thrilled when she finally caught up to what I was seeing. 

Dear Emmie Blue is full of every emotion you can imagine. Some good, some bad, but that's life and Lia Louis has written a novel that is so lovely and realistic and heartwarming that you can forgive the bad because the good is so, so wonderful. This novel gave me a major book hangover and it will stick with me for a long, long time. I highly recommend it!

*An egalley of this novel was provided by the publisher, Simon & Schuster Canada, via NetGalley in exchange for review consideration. All opinions are honest and my own.*