It Ends With Us: The emotional #1 Sunday Times bestseller

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In the future . . . if by some miracle you ever find yourself in the position to fall in love again . . . fall in love with me.” I was never in this situation so I can't speak from experience but now I understand the women who stay.. It's not because they like being slapped or punched or beat up. It's because they love that person with their whole heart! And even if he doesn't know how to love her the right way, she does!

I did not go into this book blindly.. I had seen some tik tok's about it and I knew this was a story of abuse and so, when I saw people saying they didn't like Ryle I immediately put 2 and 2 together and figured it out the reason why. Rather than trying to sugarcoat my thoughts, I'm just going to be completely honest. I was 100 percent team Ryle from the very first time we met him. Just like Lily, I fell in love with every word and every gesture that rolled off of his body. I. WAS. HOOKED. It also didn't help that I kept fantasizing Doctor Mike as Ryle Kincaid. *heart eyes emoji* I loved his ambition. His personality. His confidence. To be honest, I think I might've loved Ryle even more than Lily did but that's another story for another day. That more than likely explains why I took the second half of this book like a blow to the gut. To be honest, I was actually feeling a bit more bitter than I'm making it seem after that ending. But after reading the author's note, it really put things in perspective for me and made me look at the story with brand new eyes. I developed a new understanding and appreciation for the story behind the story.

I know some of you are probably sniffing out a love triangle and freaking out. In my opinion, that is NOT what this is. Some may call it a love triangle on a technical basis, but it really is not and I urge you not to skip this one for that reason because that term is to cliched for what this book actually is. It Ends With Us was beautifully complicated. It was hot and cold. Up and down. Good and bad. Beautiful and ugly... I'm still trying to figure out how I really feel about it all because I'm genuinely torn on how I want to perceive this storyline. I loved it but in all honesty, I really do think I hate it as well. Not the "I-hate-you-Colleen-Hoover-stop-writing-books-and-find-a-different-career" type of hate but rather "I-hate-you-Colleen-Hoover-for-making-me-hate-everything-that-I-came-to-love" kind of hate because it pretty much summarizes all my thoughts and feelings about It Ends With Us in one sentence. With that said though, I absolutely loved this book, there were so many moments that just broke my heart while I read it, but equally there were so many moments that filled me with so much love, joy and hope. While this was an easy read in terms of writing and flow, it was very hard for me because of the content. Until the bad moments outbalance the good ones, they can't leave, because how do you leave your person, the person you love with you whole heart?

Lily hasn’t always had it easy, but that’s never stopped her from working hard for the life she wants. She’s come a long way from the small town where she grew up—she graduated from college, moved to Boston, and started her own business. And when she feels a spark with a gorgeous neurosurgeon named Ryle Kincaid, everything in Lily’s life seems too good to be true. This is honestly not only one of the best reads of 2016, but also one of the most (if not the most) empowering. I want to give this book to every man, woman, and even teenager (it's definitely a NA/adult read) and tell them... READ THIS NOW! Do you want to know why? Because this book carries with it a very strong message, one that shows strength and courage that many people might not have at the time, but after reading will understand and gain. I honestly don't know if there has ever been a time when I was prouder to be reading the heroine's story due to her choices. Ultimately though, Colleen Hoover wrote a book that everyone can take something away from. Colleen always writes such unique stories, and this one is certainly no exception. But the one thing I will say is that this is truly her best book yet. Another thing that I found inspiring was the Lily character. Open to understanding that which she was never capable of understanding before. Also, as with the rest of the story; the understanding did not lead to buying into an excuse. Lily was gutsy and understanding at the same time. I found it something worth reading on and on through the entire book.

Customer reviews

That being said, I wish I had gone blindly into this book because I would like to see if I would fall in love with Ryle just like many people did. The truth is that I didn't like him at all right from the beginning. I want to believe that I would still feel the same way if I didn't find out previously about him because his actions are what made me dislike him so much.

The author's note was even more heart breaking than the entire book. Colleen tells us a little bit about her and her mother's experience with domestic abuse. As she gets to know him, she starts falling for him and it gets harder and harder to leave. Even when he pushes her down the stairs or pulls her hair with the intent to hurt, she can't just leave because by that point she loves that man. Her heart makes excuses for him and she forgives him again and again. The story was chilling, realistic, unpredictable, and a roller coaster of emotion. Whereas, I tend to like a lot of action to move the story forward, the emotional interactions between the characters, combined with action was something hard to put down. There were so many times that I found myself tearing up, but had to know what happened next. This story actually touched so close to home, I grew up in an abusive home and all I can say is that it wasn’t pretty, unlike this story though, my monster was my mother, the one person that should be protecting us. (Absolutely not looking for sympathy I’m just sharing that I can understand the fear that this book portrayed)Did not like that at all and definitely did not like how she just gave in and basically gave him what he wanted. I wish cutting my feelings off for the person who hurt me was as easy as I used to think it would be. Preventing your heart from forgiving someone you love is actually a hell of a lot harder than simply forgiving them.' She says "My father regretted the way he treated my mother his entire life. Mistreating her was the worst mistake he had ever made and he said he would grow old and die still madly in love with her."

As the story progresses, we start to see little things here and there that makes us, or at least made me, see why she loved him. I’m honestly not sure I would categorize this as a love triangle. I know others have, but I disagree. (view spoiler) Let me start by saying my 15 yr old daughter recommended this book to me. As a mother of two daughters I’ve spent their whole lives so far being very open and honest with them both about all things in life. The good, the bad and the ugly. I find it important to teach my girls about all things in life and not just the good stuff. We talk about relationships, friends, partners, sex, drugs, alcohol, love, money, school, banking, mortgages, the works. Anything and everything you can think of. My eldest daughter loves to read so when I come across a book that I feel shows the uglier sides of life, written in a way the is relatable to normally recommend for her to read it. It has become a good opening to conversations. So when she recommended I read this book. I brought it without thinking. She didn’t tell me what it was about, but it has now become a talking point for us.And it's hard to read because as a bystander I just wanted to help Lily and tell her that she didn't have to forgive him and that she deserved better than that. But that's how the story goes.. She forgave him and told him that if he ever did that again that she would know it wasn't an accident and she would leave him!