Review : The Geography of You and Me by Jennifer E. Smith

Title: The Geography of You and Me

Author: Jennifer E. Smith

Publisher: Poppy

Release date: April 15th 2014

Summary: Lucy and Owen meet somewhere between the tenth and eleventh floors of a New York City apartment building, on an elevator rendered useless by a citywide blackout. After they're rescued, they spend a single night together, wandering the darkened streets and marveling at the rare appearance of stars above Manhattan. But once the power is restored, so is reality. Lucy soon moves to Edinburgh with her parents, while Owen heads out west with his father.

Lucy and Owen's relationship plays out across the globe as they stay in touch through postcards, occasional e-mails, and -- finally -- a reunion in the city where they first met.

A carefully charted map of a long-distance relationship, Jennifer E. Smith's new novel shows that the center of the world isn't necessarily a place. It can be a person, too.

REVIEW

If you were to draw a map of the two of them, of where they started out and where they would both end up, the lines would be shooting away from each other like magnets spun around on their poles. And it occurred to Owen that there were something deeply flawed about this, that there should be circles or angles or turns, anything that might make it possible for the two lines to meet again. Instead, they were both headed in the exact opposite directions. The map was as good as a door swinging shut. And the geography of the thing-the geography of them- was completely and hopelessly wrong.

I read The Statistical Probability of Love at First Sight a few months ago, and I didn't love it. I had to try twice before really getting into the story, but in the end, the romance was cute. I had this one and This is what happy looks like in my TBR pile and I randomly put this in my luggage before I left for my holidays in the south of France. I wasn't even sure I would read it this week, but I did and won't regret it.

I first picked this book because the main character's name is Lucy, and mine is Lucie. Same name, different languages. I always look forward to read a book with a character that has the same name than me: A Tale of Two Cities (Lucie Manette) or the Chronicles of Narnia (Lucy Pevensie).

This book started with our two main characters, Lucy and Owen, stuck in the same lift because of a power cut in New York. They start to talk to each other, but their journey together doesn't stop there. They spend the rest of the day together, and they fall in love, like two average teenagers (even if they don't know that yet). But, their story is getting complicated, because they both have to move: Lucy in England, Owen somewhere else in the States. From that point, they'll try to stay in touch, through postcards or sometimes emails, but it gets difficult to stay in touch, because it is the way of life. From the moment I saw these characters together, I was hooked.

I read this book in almost one setting, I cried and laughed with these characters. I spent little time with them, but they grew close to my heart, and they'll stay in it for some time. I liked to read the postcards, like the one with the deepness of Loch Ness and Tahoe Lake, because it brought them together, no matter how far away they were from each other. I also liked how the author chose to deal with this situation: at some point both of them try to have someone, but it doesn't really work out.

"You know what made me less sad?"

"What?"

"Seeing you happy," he told him. "And for a little while there, it seemed like those postcards were the only thing that did the trick."

The traveling aspect of this book was so refreshing - from San Francisco to Prague, with glimpses of Paris, Seattle, Edinburgh, and so many other cities. No matter how far away, the characters thought about each other, and that was beautiful. This book doesn't want us to believe that being in love with someone abroad is easy, but that you can do it, no matter the distance. For me, it was done beautifully, and I cried the moment Lucy told Owen she was moving in London. It was cute, heartwarming and genuine at the same time. This book made me feel so many things and it's always something I appreciate.

Lucy, however, lingered on the stoop for another minute, her eyes still damp, wondering which one was true. Maybe she was homesick for New York, or maybe it was Edinburgh. Possibly it was even both. Or maybe-maybe-it wasn't a place at all.

Personally, I was touched by this book because my boyfriend is going in Germany for six months starting in September, and I could so easily relate to the characters because if that, I think I'll probably reread this book at that time. However, I think this book is underrated, so please read it!

What did you think about this book? Are you interested in it?