Love and Other Words by Christina Lauren

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Title: Love and Other Words
Author: Christina Lauren
Published by: Simon & Schuster Audio
Release Date: April 10, 2018
Format: Audiobook
Narrator: Erin Mallon
Length: 8 hours and 22 minutes
Genres: Romance, Contemporary
Potential Triggers: View Spoiler »a reference to self-harm « Hide Spoiler
Source: Libby
Reading Challenges: Lenoreo's 2020 Audiobook Challenge, Lenoreo's 2020 Beat the Backlist Challenge
Find it: Goodreads ✩ Amazon ✩ B&N ✩ Google ✩ Kobo ✩ IndieBound ✩ iTunes ✩ Book Depository
My rating:

Blurb:

Love, loss, friendship, and the betrayals of the past all collide in this first women’s fiction novel from New York Times and #1 international bestselling author Christina Lauren (Autoboyography, Dating You / Hating You).
The story of the heart can never be unwritten.

Macy Sorensen is settling into an ambitious if emotionally tepid routine: work hard as a new pediatrics resident, plan her wedding to an older, financially secure man, keep her head down and heart tucked away.

But when she runs into Elliot Petropoulos—the first and only love of her life—the careful bubble she’s constructed begins to dissolve. Once upon a time, Elliot was Macy’s entire world—growing from her gangly bookish friend into the man who coaxed her heart open again after the loss of her mother...only to break it on the very night he declared his love for her.

Told in alternating timelines between Then and Now, teenage Elliot and Macy grow from friends to much more—spending weekends and lazy summers together in a house outside of San Francisco devouring books, sharing favorite words, and talking through their growing pains and triumphs. As adults, they have become strangers to one another until their chance reunion. Although their memories are obscured by the agony of what happened that night so many years ago, Elliot will come to understand the truth behind Macy’s decade-long silence, and will have to overcome the past and himself to revive her faith in the possibility of an all-consuming love.

My Review:

4.5 stars — When my hubby came home and I was crying and told him I had only an hour left in the audiobook, but I knew there was more crying to come…well, that might have been an understatement.  I’m glad I stayed downstairs, I definitely would have woken him up.  So fair warning to anyone who has lost a parent…this one hits hard, on multiple occasions.

As a side note, I can’t tell if this review is subtly spoilery or not…like not explicitly, but if you really want to know NOTHING, then maybe skip this.  I just had so many thoughts to get out.

I’m not even sure what I’m going to be able to say about this one.  It impacted me in a very real way.  It was addicting to listen to, but at the same time I kept taking breaks because I kept feeling too much, and it overwhelmed me.  Not that this is a devastating read per say, but it was the bigness of the relationship between Macy and Elliott that kept me both stalling and devouring.  And it’s strange, because the magnitude of their feelings for one another both got to me and felt almost too much…and I can’t decide in the end.  I LOVED reading it, but it felt…exhausting.

It’s weird, because I could see bits of where this story was going to end, what the secrets were likely going to be, throughout the story — and, to be honest, I’m not always a fan of secrets teased but kept from the reader until the end…but this felt like enough hints were given that it wasn’t a complete shock, but it still had the impact that this tactic was looking for, so it only mildly bothered me.  I understood, and in the end it fit with the way this story was laid out, with pieces of the past interwoven with the present.

I loved the way the story was told, because we really got to see the relationship that developed slowly, over time, between Macy and Elliott when they were young…and it was so believable.  And I think it made for a stark contrast with the withdrawn Macy of today.  Though, in all honesty, she was always a bit reticent and afraid of loss.

I loved the connections that young Macy and Elliott made, the way they would read together, the way they felt legitimately like teenagers, including all the hormones that go with that.  I was worried that I was going to be more annoyed with Macy at the end, but I wasn’t…the way it all played out kept me connecting with her even through the hard moments.

Even though Elliott’s forthrightness and intensity was…uh, intense I guess, I really loved how unique of a character he was.  He was this beta-ish boy, deliciously nerdy and bookish…but that intensity bled into his sexual side in a way that took me offguard.  I was often thrown off by his honesty, and I will admit that his honesty made for some really uncomfortable situations.  But in the end I loved the way he didn’t hold back on his feelings as a side effect.

I really loved the families in this one.  I ADORED Macy’s father, and what seeing her relationship with him did to help us understand her more.  He was a father character that was so easy to love.  And of course the Petropoulos family was amazing, particularly in its contrast to Macy and her Dad.

As always, I loved Erin Mallon’s narration.  Amazing emotion, great range, and I loved all of her voices (but especially Elliott’s).  She nailed how I wanted them both to sound.

So yeah.  Definitely one of my faves by this duo.  I wrote this review, went to bed, and proceeded to replay certain scenes and silently cry.  Definitely a book hangover kind of book.