Book Review - The Year I Met You by Cecelia Ahern - Paperback Summer

Amazon UK

Title: The Year I Met You

Author: Cecelia Ahern

Format reviewed: Paperback

Source: Purchased

Publisher: Harper

Publication Date: 4th June 2015

Rating: 4 Stars

A thoughtful, captivating and ultimately uplifting novel from this uniquely talented author

The year that changed my life.
For Jasmine, losing her job felt like losing everything.

The year I found home.
With a life built around her career and her beloved sister Heather, suddenly her world becomes the house and garden she has hardly seen and the neighbours she has yet to meet.

The year I met you.
But being fired is just the beginning for Jasmine. In the year that unfolds she learns more about herself than she could ever imagine – and more about other people than she ever dreamed. Sometimes friendship is found in the most unexpected of places.

I've got very mixed feeling about this book. On the whole I liked it but I seemed to like all elements of it, apart from the main story hinted at in the blurb. I found that a tad flat and boring,  but everything else about the book I loved. 

Having read many of Cecelia Ahern's previous books, I am sorry to say this isn't her best story. I think I preferred her earlier books that had a touch of the unbelievable about them, whereas this was far more of a normal women's fiction book. 

My favourite character was without a doubt Heather, and I wish we could have seen more than her. Heather, has Down's Syndrome, and leads a full and very active life. And her story mainly revolves around her family relationship, as well as her first ever boyfriend Jonathan. 

Jasmine is finding it hard to stop continually overprotecting Heather, especially after their mother had died.  There is a quote midway through the book that sums their relationship completely, and equally brought a large lump to my thread as I read it.

"I'm her big sister. When our mum died, she told me I'm the big sister and I have to look after Jasmine. I do all of these other things, but protecting Jasmine is my main job." - This just about sums up Heather, and its her endless bounds for compassion that makes her so likeable. 

I found Jasmine's "relationship" with her neighbour across the street a hard one to fathom. One minute they are at each others throats, with  she seems to completely despise him, and another minute they seem to be incredibly good friends and neighbours. I know I am over simplifying the situation a bit, but that is the way it came across to me. 

I found The Year I Met You to be a very slow starter, but once it got going, I was finding it harder to put down.  It was an enjoyable story, I just found it a bit off putting that I wasn't too keen on either main character, and loved all the sub plots and secondary characters a whole lot more than Jasmine and her neighbour.