I was lucky enough to read the first chapter of this a couple of months ago, and really enjoyed it, so was very excited to read the book in its entirety!

In case you can’t be bothered to click on the link above, here’s the blurb:

“Lou Clark is back in the BRAND NEW Jojo Moyes novel Still Me, follow-up to the Number One international bestsellers Me Before You and After You.

Lou Clark knows too many things . . .

She knows how many miles lie between her new home in New York and her new boyfriend Sam in London.

She knows her employer is a good man and she knows his wife is keeping a secret from him.

What Lou doesn’t know is she’s about to meet someone who’s going to turn her whole life upside down.

Because Josh will remind her so much of a man she used to know that it’ll hurt.

Lou won’t know what to do next, but she knows that whatever she chooses is going to change everything.”

And – oh – it’s good!!

It was great to catch up with Louisa Clark and her friends and family again.  The book would probably standalone – but is much better if you have all of the back stories to everyone.

The setting of a large proportion of the book in New York is great – and even more so as we visited NYC with 2 of the kids last year. Things like ‘walking the High Line’ would have meant nothing to me before our last visit – but I could now really picture it (and totally do walk the High Line if you are in Manhattan, it’s a fabulous conversion of an old elevated train line into a public park, and feels like you’ve stepped into another world above the busy streets below). Similarly talking about Central Park (we too were ripped off by the blokes who give you a lift on a bike!) and the Loeb Boathouse (and the book has taught me how to pronounce it too!)

Lou’s relationships with her new employers, fellow staff members, neighbours, family and friends back home are all explored and are all really interesting – and change over the course of the book – dramatically driving the story forward.

Cross referencing Lou’s experiences with Will’s when he lived in New York by letters he’d written to his Mum, who’d passed them on to Louisa, was a lovely touch, and brought the trilogy full circle.

You are reminded how lovely Lou is – particularly when she has to keep a secret for her new employer.  I was (silently, the husband was asleep next to me) screaming at her to tell the truth and not cover up for someone else – but she is too nice.

I really, really, really enjoyed this. I confess to feeling that ‘After You’ has a bit of a ‘difficult second album’ about it – only because ‘Me Before You’ was such an AMAZING book, and ‘After You’ was still great – but this was FABULOUS.  And there was some snotty sobbing at the end – albeit not quite as much as when I read ‘Me Before You’ (and I still snotty sobbed at the end of the film version.  On a plane.  The children were MORTIFIED!!)

I am so pleased I read this – even though I’m struggling to fit it into an empty category of my 2018 Reading Challenge – but I enjoyed it so much, I don’t mind!