Sorry folks that I missed last week’s blog.  It broke my heart not to put some thoughts on paper, but honestly, I didn’t have much in the way of pertinent, funny, contributing information.  It was just a rough weekend and by Sunday I didn’t have anything left in me to give.  It continued through the week last week.  Wow, between the full moon and the 5 days of Mondays, it was one thing after another.  We started soccer and I think I ran myself right into the ground by Friday.

The only success I had was finishing “It Ends with Us” by Colleen Hoover.  I will start this review with this is not my “normal” reading choice, but I wanted to see the movie and I didn’t want to watch the movie without first reading the book.  I knew the book was going to be a lot to handle just because of the subject matter of domestic violence, but I still wanted to push forward.

I think Colleen Hoover is a good author, I’ve read Verity and that one was something that kept me on the edge of my seat and made me constantly nervous.  Those are MY books; I like the mystery and the anxiety and the “what next”.  This book was NOT that, but I respect her for taking on such a troublesome and prevalent topic. 

Lily Bloom is our main character who falls in love as a child with Atlas, the poor kid from the wrong side of the tracks, who moves away to better himself in hopes of being something more for her.  Honestly, the book could have just stopped here, but again I get the plot.  She meets Ryle as a 23/24-year-old young woman living in Boston.  Ryle is a doctor, very driven and from his first appearance you can tell he has a temper.  Ryle and Lily’s relationship was a slow burn, but full of “love bombing” in my opinion, but again putting myself at 23/24 in this situation, would I have seen it that way, probably not.  Today however, I am where I am and in a grounded, fully functional, partnership with my best friend and husband, and somehow, we make it workday in and day out; not without struggle or compromise or arguments, but there definitely isn’t “love bombing” going on.

Quickly, once Ryle and Lily solidify their relationship Ryle’s abuse starts.  There’s arguing, pushing, shoving, headbutting and unreasonable expectations.  This is not something Lily saw for herself, as she had seen her mother abused at the hands of her father, but Lily now understands the internal struggle of leaving and staying, which I think so many of us as quick to say, “just leave”.  However, it is not always as simple as that. 

My qualm with this book is the unrealistic outcome, and I know that Colleen Hoover drew this from her own parent’s relationship, but the abuse in this book is almost “elitist”.   Please understand that when I say this, I mean that the cycle of abuse is repetitive.  It preys on the poor, the uneducated, those with an inability to get out and who are basically in survival mode.  The book shows Lily and Ryle having conversations about his actions, where I cannot see someone with his apparent temper not coming undone and repeating his actions.  After 3 prolific incidents, Lily is pregnant, and Ryle pays their apartment and utilities and such and goes to England for 3 months for a fellowship. In DV, there is so much jealousy, resentment, fear, embarrassment, and power there is no way an abuser would leave his primary victim to their own accord for 3 months.

When Ryle returns, Lily reveals her pregnancy and there is no such outburst from Ryle.  This seems unrealistic.  He would have been madder than hell over this.  Then he continues to give Lily her time and space, while still visiting her and putting together nurseries and even staying with her in the spare room until she delivers the baby. 

The book ends with them co-parenting their baby successfully and having this successful relationship; and I think for anyone who is in a co-parenting relationship a positive one is the goal, but the lead up to this and the work put into it is not one that I saw as realistic or feasible in the amount of time that took place within the confines of this book.

I continue to stand by commending colleen Hoover for bringing such a hard topic to print and furthermore to screen (I haven’t seen the movie yet, but plan to), but I feel like this is mis-placed on the 1% versus the 99%.  I do not feel that the majority of DV victims will relate to this.  The struggle to stay or leave, YES; but the outcome (ability to leave, ability to co-parent, ability to maintain a relationship) is very far-fetched from reality.  It is a far cry from the reality most women face in leaving and fearing for their life, their children’s lives, or the constant looking over their shoulders because their abuser is going to show up at their work, or the grocery store, or their home.  The reality that if they turn their children over to this person that they may never see them again, alive.  The reality that we have seen in multiple news stories that the restraining order didn’t work, and their abuser murdered them, their kids, and then committed suicide.  These are the realities of the extent that DV can get.  This book is just a small scratch to the surface of what DV really is.

Overall, I give the book at 2.5 out of 5.  The writing was fine, the story was good, but there were some definite mis-guided attempts with unrealistic outcomes.

If you or someone you know is a victim of domestic violence, please reach out to resources in your local area. The National Domestic Violence Hotline can be reached at 1-800-799-7233, 24 hours, 7-days a week. Their website is www.thehotline.org. You do not have to suffer in silence, there is help out there.

Mariah