Love and Other Words

Introduction

Love and Other Words was written by Christina Lauren and published on April 10th, 2018, by Gallery Books publishing company. As promised after Heartless, my last review for this month is a more classic romance. When celebrating Christmas with a few very close friends of mine, we did a gift exchange, and two of us gifted this book to one another. All three of us have read and enjoyed it very much; it’s a dual timeline young adult romance with a second chance love story, and I do think it’s one that fans of the genre would have an enjoyable time reading. Those who want a general overview of my thoughts on this one can head to the Spoiler-Free Thoughts section. Those who have read the book and are looking for a deeper discussion can go on to the Thoughts section. I would love to hear other opinions on this book, so please comment on either this post or the social media posts!

If you would like to keep up with Christina Lauren, you can visit her website https://christinalaurenbooks.com/. You can also follow her on social media @christinalauren.

Plot

It has been eleven years since Macy has seen Elliot, and eleven years since he shattered her heart. When they run into one another again as adults, Macy is forced to confront the feelings she abandoned all those years ago.

Spoiler-Free Thoughts

I was immediately hooked by the prologue and interested in the dual timeline. Hearing her parents’ love story seemed cliche to me, but it did a good job at establishing what Macy’s expectations were for love versus what she ended up with in life. I felt like the stories kept me engaged because while I suspected what happened between Macy and Elliot, Lauren left enough crumbs throughout the adult timeline to speculate about the teenage one. I imagine that going back for a reread - which I have no doubt will happen eventually - the little details are going to be incredibly satisfying. The two plotlines also made it so I became incredibly invested in their relationship because I wanted them to just be together as teenagers while I also wondered what happened to break apart a seemingly strong friendship enough that they lost contact for as long as they did. I also enjoyed both timelines, which is always the goal when using a dual perspective or dual story approach; I don’t like reading books when I dread certain characters’ chapters or plotlines, but I didn’t have that problem with this one.

I like how the characters had well-defined and relatively relatable personalities. I appreciate when I can see parts of myself in the people I read about because it helps me connect with them more and become more invested in their stories. I will say that the plot itself was very straightforward, and I would go as far as to say it was basic. It’s a very classic romance, but that doesn’t mean I didn’t find it enjoyable. I still wanted to know exactly what happened before and what would happen next for both teen and adult Macy. I would classify this book as a feel-good comfort read; one that’s easy to get through and would be great to get me out of a reading slump. It would be a nice beach read during the summer. That being said, I found the ending to be very sweet and solid in its emotional impact.

As I mentioned before, I really enjoy reading about characters I can relate to, and I felt that way about Macy, especially in how she described where she was in life versus where her friends were. Being a teenager and young adult is incredibly strange because while you may be around people close in age to you, everyone is on a different path and is experiencing different milestones. It was entertaining to read that from the perspective of someone who was hyper aware of it. Something I don’t see often in my personal life that I loved in this book is honest personalities like Elliot’s. He says what he thinks, but he is also incredibly emotionally aware, kind, and empathetic, which makes him very likable.

I don’t have any major issues with this book, I genuinely enjoyed reading it and would do so again, but I didn’t feel that it did anything revolutionary. There is absolutely nothing wrong with that, and I do find those books to be very comforting in their realism, but it does feel more average to me, which is reflected in my rating; 7/10.

Thoughts

I enjoyed the mediums Lauren used to characterize each different person. For example, I felt like I knew her mom without really getting any character interactions with her because of the list she left behind and the memories shared between Macy and her dad. The emails between Elliot and Macy also did a good job in showing how they grew up both together and apart from one another while also serving as a more tangible measure of their relationship. Both timelines did a good job of showing progress in their relationship as they fell in love for the first time and again years later. Teenage versus adult romance can be difficult to capture without seeming respectively cliche and dramatic or idealistic and naive, but I felt Lauren told both stories well. Their relationship was easy to read, and the contrast between Macy and Elliot’s home lives was interesting, especially in adulthood where the contrast was - somehow - even more severe. Each was exactly what the other needed to the point it seemed they were made for one another. 

As mentioned before, I found the plot to be very straightforward and relatively predictable, particularly during the adult timeline. Macy is engaged, but I knew that wouldn’t last, especially after seeing Elliot. She finally admitted to herself that she wanted him - thank you Elliot for your blatant honesty about your feelings and Sabrina for keeping it real with Macy - and her inevitable conversation with Sean left her open to pursue a relationship with him. I will say that their teenage romance was really nice to read, especially because Elliot is truly wonderful, and he was exactly what Macy needed in her life. I also liked Sean as a character. He wasn’t right for Macy, but he wasn’t a bad guy in the slightest, and their breakup was the least dramatic one I’ve ever read, which was refreshing. They handled it like the adults they are, and it was very character-defining for him. Honestly, there was very little drama in this book in general, which I found to be really relaxing because I felt it made everything more bearable to read instead of being annoyed by excessive melodrama.

The most dramatic part of the adult portion may have been when Rachel stormed out of Thanksgiving, but even that problem more or less began and ended there. There was of course their conversation later about what happened after New Year’s Eve, but Elliot and Macy have always been so candid with one another that it was a very open and honest conversation. For the teenager storyline, the most intense part was when Macy discovered Elliot had cheated on her and the subsequent car crash with her dad. I was a bit confused because while Elliot undoubtedly struggled with the breakup - as Rachel pointed out - it seemed to me that it was going to be built up to be something more than him not being able to be with anyone else - not to minimize that struggle for him - and there was no follow-up with Rachel after Thanksgiving. I would have liked to see more there.