The problem with an intense, emotional, heart-ripping read is (1) You might run out of tissues, and (2) What do you read next?
For those of you who have finished Jojo Moyes’ Me Before You, and are now blankly contemplating bookshelves, never fear QBD is here!
Just in case you haven’t read it: Me Before You is the heart-warming, touching story of the relationship between down-and-out Louisa Clark and the wealthy quadriplegic she becomes a caregiver for. (We can’t really tell you much more without spoilers)
The Rosie Project by Graeme Simsion:
Don Tillman is getting married. He just doesn’t know who to yet. But he has designed the Wife Project, using a sixteen-page questionnaire to help him find the perfect partner. She will most definitely not be a barmaid, a smoker, a drinker, or a late-arriver.
Rosie Jarman is all these things. She is also fiery and intelligent and beautiful. And on a quest of her own to find her biological father—a search that Don, a professor of genetics, might just be able to help her with.
The Wife Project teaches Don some unexpected things. Why earlobe length is an inadequate predictor of sexual attraction. Why quick-dry clothes aren’t appropriate attire in New York. Why he’s never been on a second date. And why, despite your best scientific efforts, you don’t find love: love finds you.
Love, Rosie by Cecelia Ahern:
Since childhood, Rosie and Alex have stuck by each other through thick and thin. But they’re separated when Alex and his family move from Dublin to America. Their magical connection remains but can their friendship survive the years and miles? Misunderstandings, circumstances and sheer bad luck have kept them apart – until now. But will they gamble everything – including their friendship – on true love? And what twists and surprises does fate have in store for them this time?
The Storyteller by Jodi Picoult:
Sage Singer is a young woman who has been damaged by her past. Her solitary night work as a baker allows her to hide from the world and focus her creative energies on the beautiful bread she bakes.
Yet she finds herself striking up an unlikely friendship. Josef Weber is a quiet, grandfatherly man, well respected in the community; everyone’s favourite retired teacher and Little League coach.
One day he asks Sage for a favour: to kill him. Shocked, Sage refuses.
Then Josef tells her that he deserves to die – and why.
The Secrets of Midwives by Sally Hepworth:
Neva Bradley, a third-generation midwife, is determined to keep the details surrounding her own pregnancy – including the identity of the baby’s father – hidden from her family and co-workers for as long as possible.
Her mother, Grace, finds it impossible to let this secret rest, even while her own life begins to crumble around her.
For Floss, Neva’s grandmother and a retired midwife, Neva’s situation thrusts her back 60 years in time to a secret that eerily mirrors her granddaughter’s- a secret which, if revealed, will have life-changing consequences for them all.
Big Little Lies by Liane Moriarty:
Pirriwee Public’s annual school Trivia Night has ended in a shocking riot. A parent is dead. Was it murder, a tragic accident… or something else entirely?
Big Little Lies is a funny, heartbreaking, challenging story of ex-husbands and second wives, new friendships, old betrayals and schoolyard politics.
