{"id":2848,"date":"2013-09-11T10:14:58","date_gmt":"2013-09-11T14:14:58","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/www.fridaynirvana.com\/fiction\/?p=2848"},"modified":"2013-09-24T14:11:00","modified_gmt":"2013-09-24T18:11:00","slug":"book-review-the-girl-you-left-behind-by-jojo-moyes","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.fridaynirvana.com\/fiction\/2013\/09\/book-review-the-girl-you-left-behind-by-jojo-moyes.html","title":{"rendered":"Book Review : The Girl You Left Behind by Jojo Moyes"},"content":{"rendered":"

[amazon_link id=”0670026611″ target=”_blank” container=”” container_class=”” ]\"The[\/amazon_link]Title : The Girl You Left Behind<\/strong>
\n Author : Jojo Moyes<\/strong>
\n Genre : Romance<\/strong>
\n Publisher : Pamela Dorman Books<\/strong>
\n Pages : 369<\/strong>
\n Source : Publisher<\/strong>
\n Rating : 3.5\/5<\/strong><\/p>\n

The first half of the novel is Sophie\u2019s story. Sophie is the wife of painter Edouard Lefevre, who has left to fight in World War I. Beautiful Sophie stays back in their little town of St. Peronne with family. They attempt to survive as best as they can by running their little restaurant \u201cLe Coq Rouge\u201d. When the village is occupied by Nazi forces, and the German Kommandant in charge takes a fancy to Sophie and a portrait of hers (painted by Edourad), she must think of a way to use his ardor to reunite with Edouard.<\/p>\n

The second half of the book shifts to modern times. It is 2006, and newly widowed Liv Halston, still mourning the loss of architect husband David, finds succor in a painting he had gifted her. She meets Paul McCafferty. As their friendship is about to escalate to something more, Liv finds out that he has been commissioned by the Lefevre family to find and repatriate to them the long-lost painting of Sophie Lefevre. That painting now hangs in Liv\u2019s bedroom, the much treasured gift from her deceased husband.<\/p>\n

Both the heroines of this book, Sophie and Liv, are in a sense left behind by the men they love. Their stories also have the common thread of Sophie Lefevre\u2019s painting, a treasured possession much valued by both. Sophie\u2019s story was interesting in its detail of life in those times, and remarkable for the courage displayed by her. Relatively Liv\u2019s story failed to move; I found it a little choppy and deconstructed. And I couldn\u2019t quite believe that artwork repatriation would generate so much public fervor\/courtroom drama.<\/p>\n

Sophie\u2019s character is strong and selfless, and fairly practical-minded; she takes some very hard decisions to ensure survival. In comparison, I found Liv floundering in her sorrow and a little impractical. Her problems paled in comparison to Sophie\u2019s, and I didn\u2019t quite get her fanciful stance on the painting. Her character seemed inconsistent \u2013 she is on the brink of financial despair and unable to deal with it, yet firm enough to take on more debt to fight a courtroom battle over one painting. The romance between Paul and Liv didn\u2019t ring true either which sort of sank the second half of the book for me.<\/p>\n

The first half of the book flows smoothly; Moyes has some gorgeous word-play in here. The second half of the book displays inconsistencies which take away from the book. I really liked \u201cMe Before You\u201d <\/a>and had high expectations for \u201cThe Girl You Left Behind\u201d. While it is a pleasant read, \u201cThe Girl You Left Behind\u201d doesn\u2019t get quite as good.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

[amazon_link id=”0670026611″ target=”_blank” container=”” container_class=”” ][\/amazon_link]Title : The Girl You Left Behind Author : Jojo Moyes Genre : Romance Publisher : Pamela Dorman Books Pages : 369 Source : Publisher Rating : 3.5\/5 The first half of the novel is Sophie\u2019s story. Sophie is the wife of painter Edouard Lefevre, who has left to fight […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"rop_custom_images_group":[],"rop_custom_messages_group":[],"rop_publish_now":"initial","rop_publish_now_accounts":{"twitter_17000648_17000648":""},"rop_publish_now_history":[],"rop_publish_now_status":"pending","_uag_custom_page_level_css":"","footnotes":""},"categories":[85,74,53,3,91,97,4,76,21],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-2848","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-85","category-3-5_star_rating","category-arc","category-books","category-pamela_dorman_books","category-penguin_books","category-review","category-romance","category-women"],"aioseo_notices":[],"uagb_featured_image_src":{"full":false,"thumbnail":false,"medium":false,"medium_large":false,"large":false,"1536x1536":false,"2048x2048":false,"post-thumbnail":false,"sow-carousel-default":false},"uagb_author_info":{"display_name":"amodini","author_link":"https:\/\/www.fridaynirvana.com\/fiction\/author\/admin"},"uagb_comment_info":4,"uagb_excerpt":"[amazon_link id=”0670026611″ target=”_blank” container=”” container_class=”” ][\/amazon_link]Title : The Girl You Left Behind Author : Jojo Moyes Genre : Romance Publisher : Pamela Dorman Books Pages : 369 Source : Publisher Rating : 3.5\/5 The first half of the novel is Sophie\u2019s story. Sophie is the wife of painter Edouard Lefevre, who has left to fight…","_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.fridaynirvana.com\/fiction\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/2848","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.fridaynirvana.com\/fiction\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.fridaynirvana.com\/fiction\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.fridaynirvana.com\/fiction\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.fridaynirvana.com\/fiction\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=2848"}],"version-history":[{"count":10,"href":"https:\/\/www.fridaynirvana.com\/fiction\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/2848\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":2856,"href":"https:\/\/www.fridaynirvana.com\/fiction\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/2848\/revisions\/2856"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.fridaynirvana.com\/fiction\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=2848"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.fridaynirvana.com\/fiction\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=2848"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.fridaynirvana.com\/fiction\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=2848"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}