by Colleen Hoover

Heads up – this post contains all the spoilers!

This book has been a hot topic lately because of the Major Motion Picture that just hit theaters a couple weeks ago. I actually read this book a couple years ago, but I wanted to go see the movie in theaters and thought I’d give it a re-read before I went. Spoiler alert: after I finished the book, I had no desire to see the movie. There are a lot of controversial conversations surrounding the movie right now because the movie and book discusses and has scenes of Domestic Violence.

Just a disclaimer, I lived through years of DV with my ex-husband, in all types and forms, but this doesn’t make me an expert and I do not speak for other DV victims when sharing my opinions in this post.

The book begins with Lily Bloom just having been to her abusive father’s funeral. She is on a roof top of a building in Boston and a handsome stranger, Ryle, joins her. They get to talking, turns out he’s a neurosurgeon, handsome, funny and really wants to hook up with Lily. She considers it, but he’s called away.

Lily ends up opening a flower shop (Lily’s Blooms) *subtle eye roll* and she hires a woman help her with the shop. Low and behold, her new employee ends up being the sister of the handsome roof stranger and Lily ends up often in Ryle’s company. While Ryle is adamant that he is not interested in a relationship, he still pursues Lily and eventually they end up spending the night together.

During this time, Lily begins reading her childhood diary (that she refers to as Ellen) and this gives the reader a glimpse into her childhood, her father constantly abusing her mother, and her friendship with a homeless boy named Atlas. It’s very clear that Atlas and Lily are falling in love as she reads on and clearly something tragic happened to them at some point that caused their friendship to end. The journal entries are sprinkled through the book while we’re also reading about her blossoming (ha!) relationship with Ryle.

One night, Ryle and Lily are baking dinner and Ryle grabs dinner out of the oven without oven mitts on, you know, how a smart neurosurgeon would do, and he burns his hands. He drops the dinner and Lily nervous laughs because she didn’t know what else to do, so naturally, Ryle hits her which knocks her to the ground. Lily, who has always steadfastly declared that she would NEVER take abuse after watching her mother be abused her entire childhood, forgives Ryle and tells him it can never happen again.

Lily and Ryle go to meet Lily’s mother for dinner at a nice new restaurant, and the waiter happens to be Atlas (he actually owns the restaurant but was also waiting that day). Lily goes to the bathroom to collect herself and Atlas barges in demanding to know what happened to her face. When Lily and Atlas exit the bathroom, Ryle is there. This begins Ryle’s angry jealousy of Atlas, and it turns out Ryle has read Lily’s diaries behind her back and knew exactly who Atlas was. Atlas secretly gives Lily his card and says to call him if she ever needs anything.

There are a couple more times that Ryle abuses Lily, the last straw is when, in a jealous rage, Ryle attempts to SA Lily and headbutts her when she attempts to fight back, knocking her unconscious. She leaves her home and goes to stay with Atlas. Lily finds out she’s pregnant and throughout her pregnancy she has a hesitant, distant, but friendly relationship with Ryle and doesn’t see much of Atlas after the few days she stays with him.

When the baby is born, Lily looks at her daughter and decides right then she is divorcing Ryle. She asks Ryle what he would say to his own daughter and he tearfully says he would beg his daughter to leave her abusive husband. They have a beautiful, sweet, friendly break up. So then we get to the epilogue, where Lily and her daughter live next to her abuser and basically everything is great with them, they co-parent great, and she runs into Atlas on the street and the book implies they end up together.

Here’s my issue with this ending, this woman was rage thrown down the stairs, backhanded, choked, and almost sexually assaulted. Then the ending of this book that is supposed to be a story for DV survivors is that her rich doctor ex-husband and her live next to each other, she’s still besties with his sister, and they co-parent and he has his infant daughter unsupervised, to himself for his visitation time. This man has a short-temper, and anger issue, and he’s wildly abusive. How could this character leave her helpless infant alone with this man without setting up some sort of supervised visitation for the first long while? She’s seen this man around his sister’s baby, while there are plenty of people around and he’s putting on his best face, but she has no idea what his tempter will be like when he’s alone with his own child and no one there to watch him. This is where this book falls short, this man is a criminal (he assaulted someone multiple times)and was never charged, he hits when he’s mad or frustrated. He hit her when he dropped the dinner (which was his fault). What happens when this child makes a mess, keeps him up at night, breaks something?? I know this is fiction, and I am all for peaceful co-parenting but this ending and Ryle having zero consequences for his actions is just not for me.

So I did not go see the movie and I hope that DV survivors out there, man or woman, set healthy boundaries with your abusers if you are forced to stay in their lives. Keep a healthy distance and hold them accountable for their actions. They do not control you anymore, and the best way to show them that, is to live a happy, healthy life without them.

If you or someone you know are experiencing Domestic Violence, there is help, please call the National Domestic Violence Hotline at 1-800-799-7233.