Review #152: Love, Rosie by Cecelia Ahern

My rating: 4 of 5 stars


“True love is finding your soulmate in your best friend”

----Faye Hall, an Australian author

Indeed, the quote is very true, if we all could have a soulmate who is actually the best friend of our life. Cecelia Ahern's, the international best-selling Irish author, novel, Love, Rosie is a sweet love story between two childhood besties- a girl and a boy. Well, I wish, I could have read this book, before The Year I Met You, which is far more better and I guess the best of her creation till date. Love, Rosie falls short in the category of the characterization. We'll talk about that in a while, but now let's get into the synopsis part.




Synopsis:
Rosie and Alex are destined for one another, and everyone seems to know it but them. Best friends since childhood, their relationship gets closer by the day, until Alex gets the news that his family is leaving Dublin and moving to Boston. At 17, Rosie and Alex have just started to see each other in a more romantic light. Devastated, the two make plans for Rosie to apply to colleges in the U.S.

She gets into Boston University, Alex gets into Harvard, and everything is falling into place, when on the eve of her departure, Rosie gets news that will change their lives forever: She's pregnant by a boy she'd gone out with while on the rebound from Alex.

Her dreams for college, Alex, and a glamorous career dashed, Rosie stays in Dublin to become a single mother, while Alex pursues a medical career and a new love in Boston. But destiny is a funny thing, and in this novel, structured as a series of clever e-mails, letters, notes, and a trail of missed opportunities, Alex and Rosie find out that fate isn't done with them yet.

To be honest, I have watched the movie and it's not that good or even justifies the book/plot in anyway. PS: Watch it, only if you're a big fan of Lilly Collins, she falls perfectly into the shoes of Ahern's Rosie character and does full justice to her role. Well, I was expecting some other dude other than Sam Claflin on Alex's shoes. He is not good, and ruins all those oh-so-innocent Alex moments in the film. The storyline was kept similar to that of the book, but there were many important scenes which were not included in the movie version.

Okay now let's get to the story- I don't know why Ahern's story-telling is always so flawless, like a full-length movie unfolding right in front of our eyes. The plot, ah well, it's sweet, young love matured to adult love, and Ahern teaches us a lesson or two with this book that Love has really no age. Alex and Rosie's childhood friendship is depicted strikingly and how eventually Rosie's love for Alex turns into something rich, deep and meaningful, and how it was sad to see that Alex was still lagging behind in the matters of his heart.

The characterization could have been much more stronger based on the fact that Rosie and Alex both grew up from their innocence and both had responsibilities and mistakes to take care of, but Ahern left them as the kids and inside a vicious circle of fate where misfortune happens for over more than a decade and somewhere in the middle, I felt so boring with the same set of events happening in their lives- like they never want to grow up in their skin. Maybe that was the whole point to make the plot a sad sob story. The emotional content is quite powerful since the author described those heart-breaking events with love, compassion and utmost depth, thus pulling us into the sadness, even though we don't want to be a part of it. And the climax simply made me feel better with the story and I eventually fell in love with Rosie and Alex's unfortunate, heart-wrenching and tear-jerking story.

Do watch the movie version, if you are a big fan of Lilly Collins and Cecelia Ahern.

Verdict: Sad stories are really required to maintain the balance of our happiness and Love, Rosie falls into that category perfectly. 
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Author Info:
Cecelia Ahern was born on September 30, 1981 in Dublin, Ireland. She is the daughter of the former Irish Taoiseach Bertie Ahern. On 14th December 2009 it was announced that Cecelia had given birth to her first child with partner David Keoghan, a girl named Robin. She was secretly married on 11 June 2010 in County Kildare, Ireland. Her older sister, Georgina Ahern is married to Nicky Byrne of Irish pop group Westlife. Cecelia was a member of the Irish pop group Shimma who finished third in the Irish national for the Eurovision Song Contest in 2000. She attended Griffith College Dublin and obtained a degree in Journalism and Media Communications.

Cecelia Ahern wrote her first novel, PS. I Love You when she was twenty-one. It was published in 2004, the number 1 bestseller in Ireland for 19 weeks and sold in over forty countries. The book was adapted as a motion picture directed by Richard LaGravenese and starring Hilary Swank and Gerard Butler and released in 2007 in the United States.

Her second book, Where Rainbows End (US title: Love, Rosie or Rosie Dunne) won the German CORINE Award in 2005. She contributed with short stories to charity books and is also the co-creator and producer of the ABC comedy Samantha Who?.

Her other works include If You Could See Me Now (US title: A Silver Lining), A Place Called Here (US title: There's No Place Like Here) Thanks for the Memories (US title: Desire Lines) The Gift The Book of Tomorrow.
Visit her here


Book Purchase Links:

• Amazon US 
• Amazon India