From #1 New York Times bestselling author Jamie McGuire comes a riveting tale of first love that starts young but runs deep.The first time Elliott Youngblood spots Catherine Calhoun, he’s just a boy with a camera, and he’s never seen a sadder and more beautiful sight. Both Elliott and Catherine feel like outcasts, yet they find an easy friendship with each other. But when Catherine needs him … Catherine needs him most, Elliott is forced to leave town.
Elliott finally returns, but he and Catherine are now different people. He’s a star high school athlete, and she spends all her free time working at her mother’s mysterious bed-and-breakfast. Catherine hasn’t forgiven Elliott for abandoning her, but he’s determined to win back her friendship…and her heart.
Just when Catherine is ready to fully trust Elliott, he becomes the prime suspect in a local tragedy. Despite the town’s growing suspicions, Catherine clings to her love for Elliott. But a devastating secret that Catherine has buried could destroy whatever chance of happiness they have left.
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I confess that I took this book by imagining a YA Romance , of course we have a very sweet love story in our hands but nothing prepared my heart for all the tension I faced throughout the reading.
Elliot has serious family problems, and as he approached the girl with the gloomy looks that lives in the neighborhood, he never imagined that he would meet someone so beautiful and with such a sad look. As from the beginning he likes Catherine and will gradually doing everything to win the trust and friendship of the girl. They live magical times when they are together, even life going on complicated for both.
Catherine is a sweet and strong girl who has her life shattered when she least expects it and everything collapses right in front of her. Even though she misses Elliot’s friendship, she can not forgive him and does not allow him to approach her broken heart again.
But Elliot is persistent and again goes step by step penetrating into the built walls enveloped by Catherine and this friendship will again be heavily tested when the mother of both stand against the approach of the two and a crime shakes the small town.
With a light handwriting, Jamie Macguire tackles strong themes such as racial prejudice, bullying, and behavioral disorders, causing my poor heart to suffer at every scene in the book, and worse to being in such a state of tension that I could barely sleep while reading the book. narrated in first person by each of the protagonists, I was accompanying the pains, dilemmas and conflicts of each one besides all the involvement with the people of the town.
It brings an engaging and complex plot with well-built characters and surprising twists.
The idea of the cover and the title were well explained throughout the plot, making me like the book even more.
4/5 stars
Elliott & Catherine.
The book starts with 10 year old Elliott spending the summer at his aunt’s house because his parents are constantly fighting.
While playing around with his new camera he sees Catherine for the first time behind the huge house she lives in with her parents. But it isn’t until he’s back the summer when they’re both 15 that they talk for the first time.
His parents are still fighting all the time and her parents…. It’s difficult.
Elliott and Catherine become the bestest of friends that summer. He helps her stand up to the bitchy mean girls. They’re having a great time walking all over town to take pictures, they talk, they just spend time outside of the house. Until Elliott has to leave again – at the most traumatic moment in Catherine’s life. And she’s very mad at him for that.
But it wasn’t his fault – and when he finally comes back to her – to go to school in town and be the school’s star quarterback – she’s still mad at him and things at her house are even weirder!
But of course Elliott didn’t wait two years to see her again, to give up that easily!
Oy! That was … adorable and heartbreaking and sweet and innocent and exciting and mysterious!
An amazing book. I didn’t really expect such a huge story.
It was so full of … things!
First love. First losses. Depression. Racism. Hate. Bullying. Excitement. Fear. Lonliness. Anger. Mystery. Love. Hope.
We hope all through the book that those two will end up happily ever after at a college somewhere far away… but of course it’s not that easy. They still have a long while to go before we can even think about a happy end.
And everything is so mysterious too!!! What the heck is happening at Catherine’s house? What’s that all about?!
And we’re pretty sure some people or events will make even more problems for our darlings along the way!
Ugh – I just wanted to fast forward to the end to find out if everything would turn out amazing for Catherine & Elliott!
Amazing Young Adult romance! A very mature young adult story with lots of problems from so many different points – a really complex book! But there’s also lots of hope and love – so much love. Elliott is just the most adorable young man – the way he loves that girl!
I just loved the book! I loved both Catherine and Elliott so much and I wouldn’t mind seeing this as a Netflix show one day!