I am starting to have a bit of an identity crisis when it comes to my reviews. I don’t identify myself as a book critic, I am a book reader first and second, a recommender. Sometimes I want to write a book report like I did in middle school, and I have an active bookstagram and a blog because I really want to tell you about the book I just read.
As we mature and consume more and more content, whatever that content may be, over time we better understand what we enjoy. For awhile I used to read all of the National Book Award books and then over time realized they like books that have a much more somber and- dare I say- depressing- tone. If a book is shortlisted I almost always hate it. If those are for you, great. I am not trying to find the next pulitzer, but there is a reason why the majority of books sold in the US are romance or mystery/thriller. We like to escape into books.
Which brings me to PS I Hate You, which first of all- why is it named that, friend?
Maddie Sanderson lost her very close brother, Josh, to cancer. His best friend Dom, who she made out with in high school once, is the executor of his will. Dom lives in Philadelphia and Maddie lives in Seattle. Josh writes them 8 letters asking them to visit 8 destinations he never got to visit together and to read one letter in each place. They go to the Badlands, they go to Kansas, they go to Arizona, they go all over. Not as a road trip but as 8 distinctly separate vacations. Maddie has asthma and Dom takes care of her, she learns why he got married right after hooking up with her in high school, and his younger twin brothers are funny and lovable jocks. Her mother is awful.
My favorite character was Josh, although he was dead the entire book.
Dom is smart, sexy and a good brother, if a bit controlling. At the end he is over-the-top perfect book boyfriend, and truly unrealistic, honestly. Maddie is incredibly angry, mean, and self-pitying. It was hard to see her grieve. I truly don’t begrudge anyone to
I looked back at Lauren Connolly’s other titles, and she usually doesn’t write deep romance but what I am going to call smutty romance. I follow lots of fun people who love smutty romance, it is not for me, I find it cringy, but that is a personal preference. I like a sweet romance, some call it “clean” or “closed door” romance. A lot that are specifically classified like this can be heavy handed on the purity culture, and don’t even want any swearing, and can go overboard in the other direction. So me? I am sex positive and all, but I just don’t want to read descriptions of things best kept inside the bedroom.
So while I read a lot of romance it is easy for me to skip to the end of the chapter when I come across this part. Friends, I have a feeling that Lauren Connolly really excels in this area, but the bedroom parts are HORRIFYING to me, and I know for a fact that if that is your thing, they are really well done.
It is hard to rate this- I was mortified at how Maddie grieved and how mean she was to the people in her life. But who am I to judge how people grieve? Dom was pretty wonderful but yet he was truly unrealistic and I had to actually roll my eyes at him the last 10% of the book.
We are not responsible for our feelings, but we are responsible for how we treat other people when we are in our feelings.
The premise is interesting, the writing and the pacing is great, the locations are wild and well thought out. The characters are in no way boring, they are interesting and truly well developed. This is a great book in many ways but I would never return to it.
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