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A review by emmabreads
One True Loves by Taylor Jenkins Reid
3.0
• ────── ⚘ ────── •
★★★☆☆ - 3.5 stars
this was a decent book! there were lots of beautiful quotes about heartbreak, grief, and love.
the writing wasn’t the best i’ve ever read, but it was still good enough to have meaning. taylor jenkens reid writes about grief so well, i felt as if i were experiencing it myself. i thought the second-person approach for the grief chapters was a little weird though.
the book was structured nicely. each section was about a different chapter of emma’s life. i read this quickly and wasn’t ever bored!
emma: i didn’t particularly fall in love with her character, but it was really nice to read about how she developed as a person and navigated heartbreak. if i were closer to her age, i’m sure i would have related to her a bit more. it was touching to read about how she found herself and what made her truly happy. self-discovery is one of my favorite themes of the book. it is always such an impactful element!
sam: i loved him the best out of both men, which feels wrong to say, but i’m saying it anyway. i mostly loved the person emma was with him. he was patient, kind, and so utterly sweet. i came to adore him even more when he allowed emma to work out her issues with jesse on her own, instead of getting in the way. he’s a man who truly knows what it is to love. i literally can’t get over how selfless he was. i learned that love doesn’t need to be complicated, it can be what emma and sam have.
jesse: his story was a bit too outlandish for me. stranded in the middle of the fucking pacific ocean for three years surviving off of salt water and oysters?? that wasn’t the weird part for me, it was the fact that he barely talked about it with emma. if i figured out my husband came back from the dead after living on a rock for years, i would want some answers! he just expected life to go back to normal. i know he apologized at the end, but i wasn’t really rooting for him and emma like i thought i would be.
the summary says they were “high school sweethearts” but truly, they were just a couple of drunk teenagers who decided they liked each other while hiding from the cops—while sam on the other hand, had a crush on emma since freshman year, and handled being in the friend zone so emma could be happy with jesse. i realized emma and sam have more history, even if it wasn’t romantic.
also, emma and jesse were literally drunk half the time! they fell in love when they were drunk after all. jesse reappears and all he wants to do is sleep with emma like nothing happened. their relationship felt too physical for me to actually care. the only thing they had in common was wanting to move far away from their parents, as every teen does. but as emma moved through her grief, she realized that settling down somewhere isn’t bad at all. jesse, until the end, would not accept that.
he said everything that needed to be said at the end, and i’m happy with the decision that was made. to be honest, i did cry a bit. i expected that though, TJR loves to make me sob!
so, i don’t hate jesse. things turned out fine in the end, and i think his character was only present to teach a lesson about love, which he did. life moves in stages, and sometimes, it’s better not to dwell in the past—especially when you realize that you’re better off in the present.
overall, it was a touching story. nothing i’ll ever think about again, but if you want a quick read with some good themes, i’d pick this up!
quotes
It breaks my heart to hear loved like this, to be loved so purely that I’m capable of breaking a heart.
It’s rare that you love e person who loves you, that you love only the person who loves only you. But I guess that’s why true love is so alluring in the first place. It’s hard to find and hold on to, like all beautiful things. Like gold, saffron, or an aurora borealis.
You can’t capture love in a bottle. You can’t hold on to it with both hands and force it to stay with you.
We loved each other and we lost each other. And now, even though we still love each other, the pieces don’t fit like they used to.
Don’t ever let anyone tell you the most romantic part of love is the beginning. The most romantic part is when you know it had to end.
I don’t think that true love means your only love. I think true love means loving truly. Loving purely. Loving wholly.
• ────── ⚘ ────── •
★★★☆☆ - 3.5 stars
this was a decent book! there were lots of beautiful quotes about heartbreak, grief, and love.
the writing wasn’t the best i’ve ever read, but it was still good enough to have meaning. taylor jenkens reid writes about grief so well, i felt as if i were experiencing it myself. i thought the second-person approach for the grief chapters was a little weird though.
the book was structured nicely. each section was about a different chapter of emma’s life. i read this quickly and wasn’t ever bored!
emma: i didn’t particularly fall in love with her character, but it was really nice to read about how she developed as a person and navigated heartbreak. if i were closer to her age, i’m sure i would have related to her a bit more. it was touching to read about how she found herself and what made her truly happy. self-discovery is one of my favorite themes of the book. it is always such an impactful element!
sam: i loved him the best out of both men, which feels wrong to say, but i’m saying it anyway. i mostly loved the person emma was with him. he was patient, kind, and so utterly sweet. i came to adore him even more when he allowed emma to work out her issues with jesse on her own, instead of getting in the way. he’s a man who truly knows what it is to love. i literally can’t get over how selfless he was. i learned that love doesn’t need to be complicated, it can be what emma and sam have.
jesse: his story was a bit too outlandish for me. stranded in the middle of the fucking pacific ocean for three years surviving off of salt water and oysters?? that wasn’t the weird part for me, it was the fact that he barely talked about it with emma. if i figured out my husband came back from the dead after living on a rock for years, i would want some answers! he just expected life to go back to normal. i know he apologized at the end, but i wasn’t really rooting for him and emma like i thought i would be.
the summary says they were “high school sweethearts” but truly, they were just a couple of drunk teenagers who decided they liked each other while hiding from the cops—while sam on the other hand, had a crush on emma since freshman year, and handled being in the friend zone so emma could be happy with jesse. i realized emma and sam have more history, even if it wasn’t romantic.
also, emma and jesse were literally drunk half the time! they fell in love when they were drunk after all. jesse reappears and all he wants to do is sleep with emma like nothing happened. their relationship felt too physical for me to actually care. the only thing they had in common was wanting to move far away from their parents, as every teen does. but as emma moved through her grief, she realized that settling down somewhere isn’t bad at all. jesse, until the end, would not accept that.
he said everything that needed to be said at the end, and i’m happy with the decision that was made. to be honest, i did cry a bit. i expected that though, TJR loves to make me sob!
so, i don’t hate jesse. things turned out fine in the end, and i think his character was only present to teach a lesson about love, which he did. life moves in stages, and sometimes, it’s better not to dwell in the past—especially when you realize that you’re better off in the present.
overall, it was a touching story. nothing i’ll ever think about again, but if you want a quick read with some good themes, i’d pick this up!
quotes
It breaks my heart to hear loved like this, to be loved so purely that I’m capable of breaking a heart.
It’s rare that you love e person who loves you, that you love only the person who loves only you. But I guess that’s why true love is so alluring in the first place. It’s hard to find and hold on to, like all beautiful things. Like gold, saffron, or an aurora borealis.
You can’t capture love in a bottle. You can’t hold on to it with both hands and force it to stay with you.
We loved each other and we lost each other. And now, even though we still love each other, the pieces don’t fit like they used to.
Don’t ever let anyone tell you the most romantic part of love is the beginning. The most romantic part is when you know it had to end.
I don’t think that true love means your only love. I think true love means loving truly. Loving purely. Loving wholly.
• ────── ⚘ ────── •