One True Loves by Taylor Jenkins Reid Review
4.5 Smooches
Synopsis
From the author of Maybe in Another Life—named a People Magazine pick and a “Best Book of the Summer” by Glamour and USA Today—comes a breathtaking new love story about a woman unexpectedly forced to choose between the husband she has long thought dead and the fiancé who has finally brought her back to life.
In her twenties, Emma Blair marries her high school sweetheart, Jesse. They build a life for themselves, far away from the expectations of their parents and the people of their hometown in Massachusetts. They travel the world together, living life to the fullest and seizing every opportunity for adventure.
On their first wedding anniversary, Jesse is on a helicopter over the Pacific when it goes missing. Just like that, Jesse is gone forever.
Emma quits her job and moves home in an effort to put her life back together. Years later, now in her thirties, Emma runs into an old friend, Sam, and finds herself falling in love again. When Emma and Sam get engaged, it feels like Emma’s second chance at happiness.
That is, until Jesse is found. He’s alive, and he’s been trying all these years to come home to her. With a husband and a fiancé, Emma has to now figure out who she is and what she wants, while trying to protect the ones she loves.
Who is her one true love? What does it mean to love truly?
Emma knows she has to listen to her heart. She’s just not sure what it’s saying.
Review
‘Everything that happened before today feels different now, and I have no idea what happens after this.’
The thing that makes books so spectacular is her ability to that unbelievable stories and make them feel so incredible real. There are easy outs or clear winners. There isn’t one guy who does something awful so it is abundantly clear who you should be rooting for. In One True Loves Emma is very deeply in love with two men. One she married and lost and one who came back at a time and helped healed her.
“Are you kidding? You are my one true love. I don’t even think I’m capable of loving anyone else.”
When Emma loses the man she has loved for nearly ten years at sea the day before their one year wedding anniversary she is sure she will never move on. Then as it always does time helps heal and years later Sam re-enters her life and starts to put the pieces back together. But then one night while out to dinner with her parents and her now fiancé, Sam, she gets a call she never expected. Jesse her husband has been found and is coming home. How can she choose between the man she grew up loving and thought she lost or the man who taught her how to love again.
‘Good things don’t wait until you’re ready. Sometimes they come right before, when you’re almost there.’
This story left me breathless and desperate to keep turning pages to get to the end. The only thing I really have to say about it was that for the first half of the book there simply was not enough dialogue for me. While the internal dialogue was incredibly interesting for me personally I just need more conversations to keep the story going. But the dialogue picked up in the second half and I was reading with baited breath waiting to figure out who she picks and how it all comes together.
‘By loving the two of them , I am no longer sure about either. And by being unsure, I might just lose them both.’
Taylor Jenkins Reid is a phenomenal storyteller. She gives you a story you never knew you wanted but am so glad you read. Love triangles aren’t always my thing, they are hard and I get overly attached to one guy so often I just avoid them. But I am so glad I took this leap and read One True Loves. It was a beautiful and unique love story. I honestly cannot wait to read more by Taylor in the future. Trust me, don’t be scared, just dive into this book and get lost.
~miranda
