The Best Books To Read After It Ends With Us
Why we love it:
- A slow-burning romance that will have you gripped
- Written from a first-person point of view bringing the characters to life
- More than just a romance novel. Dealing with a complicated subject matter in such a delicate way
Adapted for a box office hit in 2016, Me Before You follows the unlikely love story of Louisa Clark - your run-of-the-mill girl with a fairly steady life, and Will Traynor - a successful, brash businessman who’s always lived life in the fast lane, despite being wheelchair bound since an accident. Louisa starts working for Will and refuses to put up with his moodiness. Whilst Will and Louisa grow closer, he confides in her with a shocking plan he has for his own future, so she decides to show him that life is still worth living, with heartbreakingly romantic consequences. This book will stir every emotion within you with moments of laughter and joy to despair. But more importantly it delicately treats the moral dilemmas that come with euthanasia as well as the emotions that carers go through whilst living with people who have a disability.
Call Me By Your Name by Andre Aciman
Why we love it:
- A introspective look at infatuation and first love
- An honest portrayal of intimacy in a gay relationship
- An ending that will leave you feeling like an emotional wreck
A beautiful piece of LGBTQI literature, Call Me By Your Name is a novel heavily loaded with desire, passion and intimacy. Powerfully written, this coming of age romantic drama follows Elio, an adolescent boy living on the Italian Riviera at his parent’s house. One day, house guest Oliver arrives for a six week stay, igniting an immediate and desperate attraction between the two. As the days and weeks go by, both try to ignore the charged atmosphere between them, burying their desires which develop into obsession and fascination with one another. If you enjoy a deep, sultry read, this is the perfect novel to go to after it Ends With Us, with beautiful descriptions of intimacy and of that unforgettable ‘first love’ we all remember.
The Fault In Our Stars by John Green
Why we love it:
- Super sad and heart breaking
- Great story about life, death, faith and hope
- Has a great message about how to enjoy life even when it’s tough
Hazel is just 16 but has been diagnosed with terminal lung cancer. She reluctantly attends a cancer support group but when she meets Augustus, a teenager who’s recently been given the all clear from his bone cancer. Love grows between the two as the story weaves in and out of sadness, romance and an ever-nearing inevitable end. The Fault in our Stars will shake you awake and make you realise that life is here to enjoy! A definite tearjerker, this book is as uplifting as it is devastatingly sad.
Why we love it:
- Story about a young girl who falls in love with an older man
- A slow burning romance that really explores love through the eyes of both characters
- As steamy as a CoHo book gets
Tate Collins doesn’t have time for a relationship, but when airline pilot and love cynic Miles Archer appears in her life, there’s a mutual attraction neither of them can deny. So they embark on a bit of a friends with benefits kind of arrangement. That is until rules get broken, hearts shattered and love gets ugly. This steamy romance from Colleen Hoover will have you hooked from the beginning. We love the well-developed characters and moody scene-setting in Ugly Love, and we think you will too.
Why we love it:
- Explores everything from love, marriage, family and loss
- Written from alternative viewpoints, which adds an extra layer to the story
- An author who writes light and funny scenes as well as she writes heartbreakingly sad ones
Glamorous Hollywood star, Evelyn Hugo enlists wet behind the ears journalist, Monique to pen her biography. Evelyn has lived quite the life and is keen to capture every part of it, including all of her seven marriages, of which she has outlived each and every husband. As Monique does her best to uncover all of Evelyn’s truth in her book, they revisit a life lived over decades from the 1950’s to the present day, uncovering closeted sexuality, lust, love, heartbreak and loss. As Evelyn and Monique form a special bond, their own lives begin to entwine in a way neither had expected.
Safe Haven by Nicholas Sparks
Why we love it:
- Has one of the all-time great twists in a romance novel
- A great story about a man who is struggling to come to terms with his past and is forced to confront his fears
- A romance novel that beautifully explores love and forgiveness
Katie is running from her past and into a new life in Southport, North Carolina. With the past nipping at her heels, she does her best to avoid making deep connections with the new people in her life. But when she meets Alex, a widowed shopkeeper and Jo, an outspoken and supportive neighbour, Katie’s guard gradually starts to slip away. But Katie’s past secrets continue to haunt her as she starts to cling ever more desperately to the safe haven she now calls home.
Love and Other Words by Christina Lauren
Why we love it:
- Will have you feeling a range of emotions from anger to happiness to heartbreak
- Plot is conventional, but the writing makes you forget all about that
- A story that is so absorbing you’ll consume the whole book in a couple of days
Love and Other Words tells the story of a lost love that reappears decades later. Macy is planning her wedding to her affluent fiancé and keeping her head down when she meets Elliot again - her first love who broke her heart on the very same night he told her he loved her. The life Macy has built around her starts to break away as she revisits the past with Elliot - how they grew together and went from strangers to friends to lovers and back to strangers again. Their chance reunion opens painful questions about how it all fell apart and what the future now holds for them both. You’ll love how this novel is written from both present and past perspectives, as you get to compare then and now.
Picture Perfect by Jodi Picoult
Why we love it:
- A beautiful exploration of a mother-daughter relationship that isn’t perfect
- A gentle exploration of how a person's past can affect their future
Cassie Barrett is a renowned anthropologist living the seemingly high life with Hollywood’s greatest actor, Alex Rivers. To the outside world, the couple have the dream life we all strive for, but behind closed doors, it couldn’t be further from the truth. After questioning how she can escape her life, Cassie wakes up, injured and bleeding with her memory completely gone. She has no idea who she is or how she got there, until Alex Rivers finally comes forward to claim Cassie as his wife. As Cassie tries to adjust to her fairy-tale life back in Bel-Air, she feels that something isn’t right. When her memory begins to return, her picture-perfect life starts to fall away.
Why we love it:
- A beautiful story with rich and complex characters
- An interesting exploration of love and loss and what true love means
- The writing is so devastatingly beautiful that it will leave you on the edge of your seat whilst reading it
Life for Emma Blair is going well. She’s married to her high school sweetheart, Jesse, and the couple enjoy a full life of travel and adventure together. Until the day of their first anniversary when Jesse disappears, seemingly forever. As Emma mourns and attempts to rebuild her life without her husband, she moves to a new home in the hope it will give her the fresh start she desperately needs. A decade later, Emma has a second chance of life-long happiness when she meets and falls for Sam. But as she starts to believe she can be happy again, Jesse is found, very much alive and well and desperate to reconcile with Emma.
Summary
So those are some of the best books to read after ‘It Ends With Us’. As you can imagine, there are plenty of whirlwind romances in there - but there are also books that explore topics as serious as euthanasia, cancer and the meaning of life. And that’s the beauty of a good romance novel, it can explore difficult subject matter in a light and delicate way.
If you’re looking for more romance novels, then you can check out our list of the best chick-lit books to read. Or if you just want to get stuck into some more CoHo then check our guide on what order to read Colleen Hoover books.
