New Book Review From The Entertainment Critic: Love The One You're With by Emily Griffin

Love The One You’re With

THE ENTERTAINMENT CRITIC BOOK REVIEW, BY JAMES MYERS
http://www.theentertainmentcritic.com/
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LOVE THE ONE YOU’RE WITH
By Emily Giffin
Publisher: St. Martin’s Press
Publication Date: May 2008
Price: $24.95
352 Pages
ISBN-13: 9780312348670
Four Star Rating ****

BESTSELLING AMERICAN AUTHOR OF SEVERAL NOVELS COMMONLY CATEGORIZED AS "CHICK LIT".
GIFFIN WRITES STORIES ABOUT RELATIONSHIPS AND THE FULL ARRAY OF EMOTIONS EXPERIENCED WITHIN THEM

2002: SHE MARRIED, FOUND AN AGENT, AND SIGNED A TWO-BOOK DEAL WITH ST. MARTIN'S PRESS. WHILE DOING REVISIONS ON SOMETHING BORROWED, SHE FOUND THE INSPIRATION FOR A SEQUEL, SOMETHING BLUE.

2003: GIFFIN AND HER HUSBAND LEFT ENGLAND FOR ATLANTA, GEORGIA. A FEW MONTHS LATER, ON NEW YEAR'S EVE, SHE GAVE BIRTH TO IDENTICAL TWIN BOYS, EDWARD AND GEORGE. SOMETHING BORROWED WAS RELEASED SPRING 2004. IT RECEIVED UNANIMOUSLY POSITIVE REVIEWS AND MADE THE EXTENDED NEW YORK TIMES BESTSELLERS LIST. SOMETHING BLUE FOLLOWED IN 2005, AND IN 2006, HER THIRD, BABY PROOF, MADE ITS DEBUT.

ALL THREE NOVELS WERE INTERNATIONAL BESTSELLERS, AND APPEARED ON THE NEW YORK TIMES BEST SELLER LIST AMONG MANY OTHERS. THE THREE APPEARED SIMULTANEOUSLY ON USA TODAY'S TOP 150 LIST, A RARE FEAT. SOMETHING BORROWED AND SOMETHING BLUE HAVE BEEN OPTIONED FOR FILM

LOVE THE ONE YOU'RE WITH, WAS RELEASED ON MAY 13, 2008. HER FOURTH BOOK

“And that’s when my cell phone rang and I heard his voice. A voice I hadn’t heard in eight years and sixteen days.

Was that really you? he asked me. His voice was even deeper that I remembered, but otherwise it was like stepping back in time. Like finishing a conversation only hours old.
Yes, I said.

So, he said, You still have the same cell number.

Then after a considerable silence, one I stubbornly refused to fill, he added, I guess some things don’t change.

Yes, I said again.

Because as much as I didn’t want to admit it, he was sure right about that.”



The New York Times bestselling author, Emily Giffin, has given us yet another novel examining complex relationships, and ordinary people placed in uncomfortable moral situations. She follows her first three brilliant relationship novels, Something Borrowed (One night stand with best friend’s fiancé), Something Blue (Plain Jane steals fiancé from pregnant friend) and Baby Proof (Settled couple’s issues over having a baby) with another soul searching book, Love The One You’re With. After all three of her first novels appeared simultaneously on USA Today's Top 150 list, a feat rarely accomplished, her fourth novel follows up with yet another ethical question that has occurred to all of us at one time or another: How can I love the one I’m with, when I can’t forget the one that got away?

Ellen and Andy seem to have the perfect marriage. It is their first year of marriage. They are deeply in love and devoted to one another. They do what all good partners do; they make each other better people. Unexpectedly, one afternoon, Ellen runs into an old flame, Leo for the first time in eight years. Leo makes Ellen feel like a bad girl; he brings out the ‘worst’ in her. Their experience was all about sensational sex, followed by Leo’s disappearance. Leo left Ellen heartbroken with no explanation; he is the one that got away; the one she cannot quite forget. Giffin let’s us play spy and gives us a birds eye view of what life could have been like if the one the got away had stayed or you rediscovered him later in life. Ellen tries to deal with her long dormant feelings and longing for Leo. The dilemma raises the question: Is the life you’re living the one you were meant to live? How my life would have turned out if I was with someone else, doing something different? Ellen at her cross roads make certain fascinating choices that make the book a must read for this summer.

Giffin is known for her tightly woven, unpredictable plot lines and off-beat and quirky character development. Love The One You’re With had plenty of both in spades. I found myself rooting for Ellen and pleading with her at times to make the right decisions. The book is a quick, page turner of a read that unfolds with the precision of film. The storyline is spellbinding; but the writing and the prose make this book. America’s favorite chick lit writer is back with a winner. You are watching the development of the finest author of her genre. Love the One You’re With left me wanting more. This one should be in your beach bag this summer.