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Before I Met You

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3.87 8,127 ratings 754 reviews
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After her grandmother Arlette's death, Betty is finally ready to begin her life. She had forfeited university, parties, boyfriends, summer jobs - all the usual preoccupations of a woman her age - in order to care for Arlette in their dilapidated, alb... MoreAfter her grandmother Arlette's death, Betty is finally ready to begin her life. She had forfeited university, parties, boyfriends, summer jobs - all the usual preoccupations of a woman her age - in order to care for Arlette in their dilapidated, albeit charming home on the English island of Guernsey. Her will included a beneficiary unknown to Betty and her family, a woman named Clara Pickle who presumably could be found at a London address. Now, having landed on a rather shabby street corner in '90s Soho, Betty is determined to find the mysterious Clara. She's ready for whatever life has to throw her way. Or so she thinks . . .

In 1920s bohemian London, Arlette De La Mare is starting her new life in a time of postwar change. Beautiful and charismatic, she is soon drawn into the hedonistic world of the Bright Young People. But two years after her arrival in London, tragedy strikes and she flees back to her childhood home and remains there for the rest of her life.

As Betty navigates the ups and downs of city life and begins working as a nanny for a rock star tabloid magnet, her search for Clara leads her to a man - a stranger to Betty, but someone who meant the world to her grandmother. Will the secrets of Arlette's past help Betty find her own way to happiness in the present?

A rich detective story and a captivating look at London then and now, "Before I Met You" is an unforgettable novel about two very different women, separated by seventy years, but united by big hearts and even bigger dreams. Less

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Average rating 3.87  ·  8,127 ratings  ·  754 reviews

rated it really liked it
over 7 years ago
Recommends it for: Fans of Jojo Moyes or emotional litfic
Recommended to Stacia (the 2010 club) by: Picked up on a whim because the idea looked intriguing

He was not a boss-eyed sailor. Or a rapist. He was a legend.

...and that folks, is where I cried. There is something about a story where the truth comes out of hiding that really does something to me. While I didn't quite make it to Jellicoe Road snot-inducing tea
...more

rated it did not like it
about 4 years ago

Shelves: boring-books
I'm the only person on Goodreads so far to give this book one star. I have read all of Lisa Jewell's other books and thoroughly enjoyed them. But I just didn't care about this one. The writing was formulaic, you knew exactly what was going to happen, the characters were one ...more

rated it it was ok
about 1 year ago

I've been on a Lisa Jewell kick, and enjoying reading through her backlist. I have to say, this one is my least favorite by far. I almost had a hard time believing this was the same author.

Two alternating timelines, one Arlette- post WWI England, falls in love with a famous
...more

rated it did not like it
over 7 years ago

A good idea for an interesting plot, but the author couldn't get far enough away from her usual chick lit style to do it justice. The result was much too twee for me and also littered with silly and avoidable inaccuracies. Of these, for me, the worst was on page 430: "a big, ...more

rated it it was amazing
almost 7 years ago

For me, curling up with a Lisa Jewell novel is like curling up with a coffee in front of a warm fire – comforting, cosy with the guarantee that it will warm the cockles of my heart. This book did not disappoint. Well-written, vivid and at once warm and funny and poignant and ...more

rated it it was ok
about 7 years ago

I bailed at 72%. I just really hated this book and its heroines. I will give it points for keeping me intrigued. After all, I kept plunging along even though I disliked its heroines. I kept thinking, "Well, I want to know what happened" even after I figured out who the myste ...more

rated it liked it
almost 5 years ago

I've read and enjoyed Lisa Jewell's books for more than ten years, and I highly recommend both One-Hit Wonder and A Friend of the Family. But Before I Met You left me cold. Jewell does a good job of portraying the combination of wide-eyed wonder, tinge of fear, and naive det ...more

rated it really liked it
7 months ago

This felt like a departure from other Jewell novels I’ve read.

It’s not a romance, but it was essentially a study of how the romantic missteps of two women in different periods shaped the development of their lives and personalities.

And very oddly, they both seemed fairly o
...more

rated it it was ok
over 6 years ago

Shelves: 2014
I was expecting this to be better than what it was. It started off great but then somewhere in the middle I kind of lost interest. I wanted to know what happened so I kept reading but I didn't really get into the characters. Just finished with a lukewarm feeling overall. Jus ...more

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Book details

Paperback, 458 pages
Published July 19th 2012 by Century
ISBN
1846059232 (ISBN13: 9781846059230)
Edition language
English
Original title
Before I Met You

About this author

28,963 followers
Lisa was born in London in 1968. Her mother was a secretary and her father was a textile agent and she was brought up in the northernmost reaches of London with her two younger sisters. She was educated at a Catholic girls’ Grammar school in Finchley. After leaving school at sixteen she spent two years at Barnet College doing an arts foundation course and then two years at Epsom School of Art & De ...more

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Quotes

you are the only woman I have ever met who I would want to be in a little house with, do you see? Other women make me want to get on boats and run away. You, you make me want to stay somewhere, so that I can see your face everyday. So that I can hold you everyday and watch you grow older. You make me want to be an adult man. You make me want to settle down.
You never really know a person until after they're dead. That's when it all comes out. All the stuff they locked up in boxes. All the secrets, all the lies. That's when you really know the truth.
You're here every night, you join in, but you always seem to be - I don't know - more of a spectator than a participant, as if you are studying us, possibly for some sort of anthropological purpose. Do you even like us?

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