Since having my son and, more recently, since launching Oh, She Blogs!, it has been incredibly difficult for me to take the time to sit down and read a book. In fact, I haven't finished a book since before my son was born, which is all sorts of depressing since there's nothing I love more than reading. That all changed when I was given the opportunity to read Emily Giffin's new novel, First Comes Love. I dropped everything to read the book in two sittings.
I'm a long-time Emily Giffin fan and view her as one of the reigning queens of chick lit. A few years ago, we were heading to Hawaii to attend a wedding and I picked up Giffin's Something Borrowed on a whim to read on the plane. Well, I finished the book long before the plane landed and then forced my now husband to walk nearly two miles to the Barnes & Noble in Honolulu so that I could purchase Something Blue… and the rest of the books she had released by then.
While I'm a huge fan of Emily Giffin, I have been disappointed by her past couple of books. She had such a great formula worked out but then it felt like she lost her way. As I was reading First Comes Love, however, I kept thinking, “Emily Giffin is back!”
Giffin returns to what she does best in First Comes Love, and that's writing about relationships. Not romantic relationships, necessarily, but relationships with loved ones. In this instance, Giffin writes about the relationship (or lack thereof) between two sisters, Josie and Meredith, who are still reeling from their brother's death in a car accident 15 years earlier. I honestly didn't like Josie or Meredith as characters. Josie likes to make everything about herself and Meredith comes across as an unhappy and demanding shrew, but the relationship the two have with one another is more than believable.
I like my chick lit to have romance, and while it seems like Josie might find love with a few different suitors, it never really happens. First, there's Will, the oft-obsessed about ex-boyfriend who reappears… and then disappears just as quickly. Then there's Gabe, the roommate and best friend with whom she seems to have great chemistry but with whom she says nothing will ever happen. And then there's Pete, the dude she meets on Match.com who is too nice to be believable… and almost creepy as a result. Meredith has her own woes, as she has a job she hates (as an attorney) and an adoring husband whom she is no longer sure that she loves (or that she ever loved).
First Comes Love is very much about the love of family, be it the siblings that are family from birth or the family that you choose, and the things you will do – or won't do – for those people. This book isn't perfect, and I'd only give it 3 out of 5 stars overall, but it feels like vintage Emily Giffin. For that reason alone, if you're a fan of Giffin's then I think you will enjoy this novel.
By the way, one of the things I love about Emily Giffin is that her stories tend to take place in either New York City or Atlanta, and the characters from her various novels typically intertwine with one another. In First Comes Love we get an update on Ellen and Andy from Love the One You're With, another of my favorite Giffin novels!
Disclosure: I received a free copy of this book to review, however all opinions expressed above are my own.
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