The Last Letter from Your Lover

Romance novels aren't my usual genre. However, I am a sucker for a book that includes written correspondence. In this case, the letters were love letters. If the story is good - and this one was - and that crucial element is included, I'm in.

The Last Letter from Your Lover by Jojo Moyes starts with Jennifer recovering from a bad car accident. She's got amnesia and can't remember what's come before. She finds a letter, what appears to be a love letter, while straightening up in her bedroom... and that starts to jog her memory. She eventually finds more and more letters, and after a chance encounter at a cocktail party, she seems to remember a big huge chunk of what's been missing from her life since the accident.

Interspersed with Jennifer's post-accident story are chapters which fill us in with details of the back story. Many of the same characters are in that story so the book was confusing at first. I didn't realize I was reading a "current" story and a back story.

The book then picks up many years later. Ellie, a journalist who is focusing too much on a bad love relationship and not enough on her career, is tasked with writing a story that connects the 1960s to the 2000s. She goes to the archives of her newspaper and is handed a folder. In the folder, she finds some love letters. She's then determined to find out more about the lovers who sent and received those letters.

Other than the confusion in the beginning, this is a well-crafted story. It wasn't too schmaltzy for me. There is some reference to asbestos and since I'm much more of a historical fiction fan, I would have really loved this book had that part been much more developed.

In any event, I'm really glad that I picked this up when I wasn't sure what to read next.