Maybe in Another Life

MAYBE IN ANOTHER LIFE

By Taylor Jenkins Reid

ABOUT MAYBE IN ANOTHER LIFE:

At the age of twenty-nine, Hannah Martin still has no idea what she wants to do with her life. She has lived in six different cities and held countless meaningless jobs since graduating college, but on the heels of a disastrous breakup, she has finally returned to her hometown of Los Angeles. To celebrate her first night back, her best friend, Gabby, takes Hannah out to a bar—where she meets up with her high school boyfriend, Ethan.

It’s just past midnight when Gabby asks Hannah if she’s ready to go. Ethan quickly offers to give her a ride later if she wants to stay.

Hannah hesitates.

What happens if she leaves with Gabby?

What happens if she leaves with Ethan?

In concurrent storylines, Hannah lives out the effects of each decision. Quickly, these parallel universes develop into surprisingly different stories with far-reaching consequences for Hannah and the people around her, raising questions like: Is anything meant to be? How much in our life is determined by chance? And perhaps most compellingly: Is there such a thing as a soul mate?

Hannah believes there is. And, in both worlds, she believes she’s found him.

ABOUT THE AUTHOR:

Taylor Jenkins Reid is an author and essayist from Acton, Massachusetts. She is the author of Forever, Interrupted and After I Do. She lives in Los Angeles with her husband, Alex, and her dog, Rabbit. You can follow her on Twitter @TJenkinsReid.

MAYBE IN ANOTHER LIFE by Taylor Jenkins Reid

Atria Books/Washington Square Press Paperback | 352 pages | ISBN:  9781476776880 | July 7, 2015 | $16.00

eBook: Atria Books/Washington Square Press | 352 pages | ISBN: 9781476776897 | July 7, 2015 | $11.99

My thoughts: Who can read a book like this one and not think of Gwyneth Paltrow in Sliding Doors? Naturally, we're going to draw parallels. There are some definite parallels, of course. The story lines were somewhat predictable but the ending was not. I really liked the conclusion, actually. 

I found a few quotes that struck me in different ways. One of them I did not highlight but was very educational to me. Hannah, the protagonist, has gift for remembering faces and facts about people. She has found that it is better to allow another introduction and the other person to remember being introduced first instead of spouting off what you remember about that person because it creeps people out. Ahh. That is good advice. It really must heed that. It doesn't impress them. It creeps them out. Noted.

"You can only muster up this type of courage a few times in your life. I'm just stupid enough to have it now."

"I much prefer problems with solutions, conflicts where one person is right and the other is wrong, all you have to do is figure out which is which."

"I'm not going to try to tell her he didn't mean to hurt her. That's absurd and meaningless."

"We are made up of the thousands of decisions and actions we make]. We have to face those consequences head on, for better or worse. We don't get to erase them just by saying we didn't mean to."

"It never occurred to me that you have to hold those things sacred."

Read it.