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The Geography of You and Me

Jennifer E. Smith (Goodreads Author)

3.68 · Rating details · 30,788 ratings · 3,439 reviews

Lucy and Owen meet somewhere between the tenth and eleventh floors of a New York City apartment building, on an elevator rendered useless by a citywide blackout. After they’re rescued, they spend a single night together, wandering the darkened streets and marveling at the rare appearance of stars above Manhattan. But once the power is restored, so is reality. Lucy soon mov ...more

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Hardcover, 337 pages

Published April 15th 2014 by Poppy

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The Geography of You and Me by Jennifer E. Smith

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Average rating 3.68 ·

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· 30,788 ratings · 3,439 reviews

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Jul 29, 2014 Kelly (and the Book Boar) rated it did not like it

Shelves: read-in-2014, arcs

Find all of my reviews at: http://52bookminimum.blogspot.com/

1 Star with a bonus Star for a good cover/title.

WARNING: I SPOIL THE CRAP OUT OF THIS BOOK

Lucy is super emo because her parents are never around and she’s friendless. (How do you avoid the oft present “we’re dealing with teenagers, where the hell are the parents” question? Well, this book just ships the parents off to Paris, leaving their 16 year old daughter at home in New York City all alone. Problem solved.)

Owen is super emo since his mom recently passed away and his father moved them to Necover/title.
WARNING: ...more

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Dec 15, 2016 Aj the Ravenous Reader rated it liked it · review of another edition

Shelves: love-love-love, auto-buy-authors, young-adult, physically-owned-books, contemporary

Funny how the story started with a total black out from New York all the way to Canada when our own power went out too. It’s like fate or something and just like fate, some things/people are just meant to be together like the spoon and fork. There are certain instances when they have to part ways because soup only requires a spoon while pasta only needs a fork but that’s perfectly okay because deep down papa spoon and mama fork know they will be together eventually. This is usually the common th ...more

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Jul 19, 2013 Farah 🌈 added it · review of another edition

"A blackout in New York City brings together two teenagers in Jennifer E. Smith's new romantic YA novel."
Let me tell you one thing, in my opinion Jennifer E. Smith is one of the best YA authors ever (+1 for the fact that she is a nerdfighter). Her books are just awesomesauce and they may not float everyone's boat but hell to the YES they make me feel all fluffy inside so long story short: I CAN'T WAIT TO READ THIS BOOK!
"A blackout in New York City brings together two teenagers in Jennifer E. Smith's new romantic YA novel."
Let me tell you one thing, in my opinion Jennifer E. Smith is one of the best YA authors ever (+1 for the fact that she is a nerdfighter). Her books are just awesomesauce and they may not float everyone's boat but hell to the YES they make me feel all fluffy inside so long story short: I CAN'T WAIT TO READ THIS BOOK!

...more

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Apr 30, 2014 Hailey (Hailey in Bookland) rated it really liked it · review of another edition

Shelves: contemporary, owned

SPOILER FREE REVIEW: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=-K6on...

3.75*
This book was basically just what I needed: a mindless, cute, fun romance that was just really easy to read. I see my reading slump coming to an end very very soon.

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Jan 24, 2014 Giselle rated it liked it

Shelves: ebook, arc

3.5 stars

Super cute as expected. Jennifer E. Smith has given us another sigh-inducing, feel-good read that leaves you with a smile on your face. I adore these books of hers and each one is like a little escape into a fairy-tale kind of perfect romance story. While The Geography of You and Me may be my least favorite of hers, it's far from a disappointment!

If you're a fan of this author you pretty much know what to expect when you get into one of her books. Her characters are likable, the romance is always swoon-worthy, and 3.5 stars

Super cute as expected. Jennifer E. Smith has given us another sigh-inducing, feel-good read that leaves you with a smile on your face. I adore these books of hers and each one is like a little escape into a fairy-tale kind of perfect romance story. While The Geography of You and Me may be my least favorite of hers, it's far from a disappointment!

If you're a fan of this author you pretty much know what to expect when you get into one of her books. Her characters are likable, the romance is always swoon-worthy, and they have this fairy-tale quality to it - meaning it's a bit idealistic and sometimes too good to be true, but it's what I love about them. Once in a while, it's fun to escape into this kind of dreamy romance story. The Geography of You and Me, however, is a little different from the others, as in the two love interests are on different continents. They meet in New York and have this incredibly romantic, butterfly-inducing evening, but they both move away shortly after. They stay in touch through postcards which have become a kind of personal joke for both of them, not to mention Owen's aversion to technology. This is super cute at first and full of hope and wonder, but it does lose its spark after a while where things start feeling a little directionless. Told in dual POVs, we see the streets of France and Scotland and London on one side, and a road trip through America on the other. While I can't complain on the settings which were really wonderful and atmospheric, it's the story itself that becomes kind of stale where after a while it consists of nothing more than two teenagers second guessing themselves and full of regret. Being separated for 90% of the book is likely part of the problem here. Even though I knew the premise of the book, I expected it to be a little more passionate and impulsive and a little less… awkward? Less radio silence for sure.

On one side we see a girl experience the world and different cultures, on Owen's side we dive a bit deeper where we see him deal with his mother's death, unsure of how to move on. This gives a little something other than romance to concentrate on, a little something more profound and serious. I also found myself much more compelled to his storyline than Lucy's for the most part, so we'll say Owen was my favorite character in this one. Eventually - and finally!! - the two do meet again and proves to be worth the wait. Statistically, long distance relationships rarely work, but this book makes you want to believe in it for these two. Absence makes the heart grow fonder, is what they say! :)

Overall, The Geography of You and Me is another Jennifer E. Smith book that I would recommend to all you hopeless romantics who want to not only escape, but travel the world with Lucy and Owen.

--
An advance copy was provided by the publisher for review.

For more of my reviews, visit my blog at Xpresso Reads

...more

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Feb 28, 2016 Daiane rated it it was ok

Shelves: chick-lit, disappointed, contemporary, meh, road-trippin, travel

Not this time Smith... Not this time.

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Jun 26, 2014 Ash Wednesday rated it it was ok

Shelves: review, young-adult, foreign-setting, contemporary-fiction, new-york

2.5 STARS
The point wasn’t the distance. It was the homecoming.

God, I just love that sentiment.

And I truly felt that this had a lot of beautiful moments and heartfelt intentions that just got lost in that thick bog of mediocrity with a droning narrative, a climax-less plot, a pair of charmless protagonists and the non-existent chemistry between them. In yet another exercise in frustration, this wasn’t offensively bad, but the stilted potential just shoves the disappointment obnoxiously THERE. Front and center. In. Your. Face.

Lucy (a fSTARS
The ...more

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Aug 22, 2013 Ari rated it it was amazing · review of another edition

Shelves: 2014, standalone, arc-galley-or-author

Adorable and quite emotional!

The Geography of You and Me is mostly descriptive - it shows snippets of moments suspended in time, it describes deep emotions, and still the author managed to 'show' not simply to 'tell' and I was soon very much in love with the beauty of this story.

There was so much that I loved about it:
- their first meeting, even the one in San Francisco, with the fiasco ending;
- the insi ...more

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Oct 31, 2013 Arianne (in uni) rated it liked it · review of another edition

Weee! 2014 is going to be a great year!
description

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Jun 16, 2016 Cherry rated it liked it

Goodness. With all the fluffiness and cuteness in the world.

description

It all starts off with a sudden blackout in the city...
Have you ever imagined a city with No electricity, No connections, and Only darkness...
A city only lit by the moon and stars...

The story's realistic and relatable and the story itself is what makes the whole book seems so adorable.

Crossed path of two young people. Blackout. Separation. Travels. Settlemeadorable.
Crossed ...more

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May 03, 2015 Sarah rated it liked it · review of another edition

Shelves: ya, z2015

3.5/5. This book was exactly what I was expecting. It was a light quick read and it was cute. When I pick up these books I don't really expect them to be life-changing or that meaningful so I hardly ever give them 5 stars. I expect these books to just give me a little bit of enjoyment and I did enjoy this book.

The characters were likeable and I liked the story. I felt the execution was okay. I think Jennifer E. Smith could have done a lot better. There was no insta-love which is always a good t ...more

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Jan 27, 2014 Maida rated it it was ok · review of another edition

Shelves: dysfunctional-individuals-families, socio-psychology, new-adult-contemporary, socio-economic, issues-of-class-or-social-standing, trauma, ya, coming-of-age

(This review has been edited to include an addendum, which will hopefully illustrate what I mean by "bad writing").

After reading & falling in love with Laura Kaye's Hearts in Darkness, I jumped at the chance to read another novel about two strangers who are trapped in an elevator in the middle of a citywide blackout. I was hoping that The Geography of You & Me would be a Young Adult (PG-13) version of Hearts in Darkness. Sadly, however, the only similarity between these two novels IS the broken elevator. ...more

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Nov 09, 2013 Susane Colasanti rated it it was amazing · review of another edition

Jennifer E. Smith represents the absolute best in YA writing, and readers will carry this poignant love story in their hearts far after the last sentence is read.

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Jun 03, 2014 Natalie Monroe rated it it was ok

Shelves: boooring, when-sparks-don-t-fly, typical, arc, cheesy-cheesy-cheesy, hate-the-characters-hate-the-book, not-as-good-as-i-expected, would-make-great-chick-flick

"His eyes caught hers through the darkness and the elevator felt suddenly smaller than it had been minutes ago."

I am becoming increasingly frustrated with YA contemporaries of late. Ever since the success of Anna and the French Kiss, there have been an influx of the same cookie-cutter romance, with their own brand of a unique 'twist', but reads more like a sad imitation of Meg Cabot in her heyday.

The Geography of You and Me falls into the same trap, except it cut more because I was expecting, well, more. This is the sam ...more

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Feb 27, 2015 Cora Tea Party Princess rated it liked it · review of another edition

5 Words: Postcards, e-mail, family, moving, travelling.

This was quite a sweet story, and I quite liked it.

But it was quite... Well. How many times have I just used that word?

As lovely as this story was, I don't think it's something that's really gonna stick with me. Sure, it was sweet and enjoyable, but there was nothing truly stand-out about it, nothing that would compel me to read again.

It was something nice to pass the time, but something that I've also quite ...more

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Mar 31, 2018 Gayathri rated it it was ok

Shelves: e-books, fiction, reviewed, 2018, a-z2018, ya

The story starts with Owen and Lucy stuck in an elevator when the whole city plunges into darkness. It is instant chemistry and once they are rescued they roam around the city and end up chatting for hours. They end up spending their night gazing at stars from their rooftop. As fate intervenes, they both leave New York City soon and part ways.

Owen and his father are trying to get over their loss of their mother and go on a road trip across America. Lucy joins her parents in London wh ...more

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Jul 14, 2017 Kate (GirlReading) rated it liked it

Shelves: contemporary

The Geography of You and Me was a cute contemporary read. Unfortunately I wasn't too invested in the characters and I've never been the biggest fan of instalove but I thoroughly enjoyed the vivid descriptions of each individual city and country this book travelled to. Having now read a few of Jennifer E. Smith's books, I'd say this was my least favourite when it came to the writing. For me, it didn't flow as smoothly and have the same fun, quick dialogue as the previous books I've read of hers. ...more

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Apr 19, 2014 Donna {Book Passion For Life} rated it it was ok · review of another edition

Shelves: for-review, ya-contemporary-romance, from-publishers

Have you ever finished a book and felt as though not a lot happened during the story? Or have you ever finished a book and felt very underwhelmed by it? Well, that’s how I feel about The Geography of You and Me and, I’m starting to feel as though maybe I’m just not meant to enjoy any of Smith’s work.

The premise of The Geography of You and Me is very cute. It’s about two teenagers – Lucy and Owen – who live in the same apartment complex but they don’t meet until they find themselves stuck inside an Have you ever finished a book and felt as though not a lot happened during the story? Or have you ever finished a book and felt very underwhelmed by it? Well, that’s how I feel about The Geography of You and Me and, I’m starting to feel as though maybe I’m just not meant to enjoy any of Smith’s work.

The premise of The Geography of You and Me is very cute. It’s about two teenagers – Lucy and Owen – who live in the same apartment complex but they don’t meet until they find themselves stuck inside an elevator together after the electricity is New York City goes out. After that one meeting, they find themselves drawn to one another but it seems as though fate has other ideas when Lucy moves to Edinburgh and Owen goes on the road, moving from place to place so his father can find work. But somehow they manage to keep in touch by short and sweet postcards and soon they find they can’t forget about each other at all.

Like I said the premise of this story is super cute – but that’s probably about it all it has to offer. Lucy’s and Owen’s story forces them to have some form of long distance relationship – if you could call it that – because they’re never really in any kind of relationship. They’re only tied by the postcards they send. They don’t speak on the phone, they very rarely email – due to Owen not liking social media – and when they do finally meet, everything seems to go wrong. Their supposed to have a deep connection with each other but it’s not something we really see right until the very last minute. During the 300+ pages of the story, 200+ pages are just about their normal day to day life and I have to say, I really found the story quite boring just because there is not any real communication between the characters during most part of the story. I was kind of expecting the story to have a swoon-worthy romance and, exciting moments and fantastic quotes with the hope of them getting together, but honestly the whole story was just so flat that it just didn’t work for me. By the end of the story the characters were in a no better place than when they first met each other and, it felt as though I’d read the whole story for nothing – no progress whatsoever.

I have one more book of Smith’s sitting on my shelf and I will give that a try soon, but if that has the same result as her other books I’ve read, I think it’s time to leave this author behind. But I do hope you enjoy this more than me.

Thank you to Headline for giving me the opportunity to review this book in exchange for an honest review. ...more

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Jul 18, 2018 Kathleen rated it liked it

Rating: 3.5

I actually really ended up enjoying this book. It’s a nice fluffy contemporary.

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Jul 31, 2013 Angela marked it as maybe-read · review of another edition

Shelves: 2014-april, contemporary

Hmm... not sure yet. Jennifer E. Smith still hasn't wrote a book that wows me. Maybe this will be the one?

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Jan 21, 2014 Amanda G. (Nellie and Co. rated it it was amazing · review of another edition

Shelves: own, favourites-2014

In the midst of problems: personally, mentally, physically, emotionally and financially, throughout the general pressure and stress of finding my way through those problems and moving on with life, I found The Geography of You and Me on NetGalley. I'd been interested in this book ever since I knew it would exist, going as far as it being my first ever Waiting on Wednesday post, and the moment I saw it, I knew I had to request it; it sounded and looked fantastic, so sitting and waiting, waiting a In the midst of problems: personally, mentally, physically, emotionally and financially, throughout the general pressure and stress of finding my way through those problems and moving on with life, I found The Geography of You and Me on NetGalley. I'd been interested in this book ever since I knew it would exist, going as far as it being my first ever Waiting on Wednesday post, and the moment I saw it, I knew I had to request it; it sounded and looked fantastic, so sitting and waiting, waiting and sitting, I checked NetGalley every hour for 3 days until I was accepted, and let me tell you, the excitement had hit a record high. Without even thinking about it, I downloaded it and waited patiently until I could read it; I read it in 3 and a half hours.

There was instantly something so simple, sweet and adorable about the entire scenario, getting stuck in a lift with someone, and how those few seconds difference could have made the biggest of changes, yet Lucy and Owen were such realistic characters, and they brought this naive and spontaneous nature to themselves that made the story what it was. There's something kind of wonderful about the thought of meeting someone in a lift, and being stuck with them and their company throughout what should have been one of the most scary experiences of somebody's life, and to then share that moment for a whole night, in the middle of a New York City blackout with defrosting ice cream and a sky full of stars, is just magical. Smith managed to make the whole thing so believable and almost like a conscious thought that I was so lost and wrapped up in the whole story from chapter one; I couldn't have asked for anything better.

Smith has produced some great characters in the past with Hadley and Oliver from The Statistical Probability of Love at First Sight, and I thought I couldn't love another sweet-talking, family guy like Oliver, but Smith surprised me with Owen, and gave me a damaged, yet caring and adventurous young man whom if I was a year younger, I'd have snapped up like a shot. Her characters suffer a lot when it comes to their parents, and sometimes, authors won't venture into deaths and AWOL parents, but Smith doesn't think twice, and really manages to show how much a single accidental death can affect and father and son relationship, and how it can start a spark in a new future for them both, how one single decision can make the difference between going forwards and going backwards. Not only did she give me Owen, but she gave me Lucy too, a girl with big dreams and an even bigger heart, who dreamt of travelling to somewhere out there, specifically Paris, and letting her heart take her to where she needed to be; a brave, charismatic and solitary young girl, and I could really relate to her on an emotional level. Their story, written across the globe in miles and postcards, via lakes and rivers, from the hills of Edinburgh to the seaport of Seattle, right back to New York, to the night they met, for me, couldn't have been more perfect.

There's something about this book that is addictive; I just couldn't put it down. It covered the aspect of growing away from people, moving on with life, taking what live throws at you, living your dreams and how your dreams aren't always what you want in the end. Something about family, the difference between having someone and not having someone, having something, somewhere, a part of you lost everywhere you've been and being happy with it. Owen and Lucy grew so much as people, growing as they learnt from their wrong relationships, growing into themselves and the journeys they took over nine months, growing as they learnt from each others lessons, and growing to meet each other once more. There was something so honest and perfect about this story, something so sweet and lovable, something so amazing about trecking across the world to find that home isn't a place, it's a person, and a feeling, a pull to something better.

This book, to me, is what home feels like. ...more

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Oct 03, 2016 Carrie rated it liked it · review of another edition

Lucy and Owen live in the same apartment building in New York but had never actually met one another until one day they end up in the same elevator when the power goes out. Stuck together the two make conversation and find they like one another. After getting out of the elevator Lucy and Owen spend an amazing night together while waiting out the blackout.

Unfortunately for this pair other circumstances end up splitting them apart as each of their families make plans to leave New York. Getting in ...more

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Jan 31, 2017 Chelsey Ellice rated it it was amazing

Shelves: book-boyfriend, young-adult, own-it, 5-star, stand-alone, romance, hardcover, covers-i-love, favourites

This book was such a fun and cute read, one that I just wanted to keep picking up to finish and see how it ended. Long distance would be so hard but it is possible. I loved how Lucy and Owen had little in jokes and I loved that on there first post card to each other they wrote the same thing. They accidentally met but they couldn't forget each other after it and loved all the little post cards. I wish we still wrote post cards

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Feb 19, 2015 Lizzie rated it it was amazing

Such a fun and cute contemporary! I loved the two main characters, as well as the duo POV's. The travel aspect was one of my favorite things about this book; I really enjoyed getting to read about London, Scotland, Paris, etc.
I think that the story overall was well written and I'm looking forward to reading Jennifer's other novels. :)

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Apr 18, 2017 Andrea rated it it was ok

Shelves: young-adult

2.5 Stars
Think of a shiny, beautiful red balloon, inflated to capacity. All that promis!! And then, a slow leak. Ffffllllllluuubbbbppppp.
That was the plot. Intriguing hook at the start, likable characters....but then it never really goes anywhere special. And everything falls flat. Oh well.

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May 20, 2014 ♥ Innocent Lamb ~ Forever Reading ♥ - AKA Smarties rated it it was amazing

Shelves: favourite-all-time-must-reads, loved-loved-loved-it, omg-i-can-t-wait, awww-moments, not-so-austen-bookclub-botm

“If you were to draw a map of the two of them, of where they started out and where they would both end up, the lines would be shooting away from each other like magnets spun around on their poles. And it occurred to Owen that there was something deeply flawed about this, that there should be circles or angels or turns, anything that might make it possible for the two lines to meet again. Instead, they were both headed in the exact opposite directions. The map was as good as a door swinging shut. ...more

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Apr 10, 2013 Christina (A Reader of Fictions) rated it did not like it

Shelves: black-sheep-baaaaa, oh-hai-instalove

You guys, I finally finished! I’m free! The Geography of You and Me has been my personal torture device for the last month. Over a month. Let’s just say that it’s entirely abnormal for a book to take me a whole month, but I would leave this and not want to read anymore. Should I have DNFed? Maybe so. However, I wanted to see if the book was really going where I thought it was going (spoiler: yes). Also, I just really wanted to like Jennifer E. Smith’s books. I mean, LOOK at that cover. It’s so f ...more

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Mar 09, 2015 isabelle rated it it was ok

Shelves: meh, realistic-fiction, booooooring, raining-disappointment, sorry-not-sorry, not-my-type, blasphemous

In. Sta. Love. My. Ass.

Review to come~

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Dec 25, 2018 Fuzaila rated it liked it · review of another edition

Shelves: contemporary, audiobooks, could-have-been-better, new-places, romance-lovey-dovey, i-didnt-get-the-point, liked-it-but-i-am-not-sure, young-adult

I don't believe in the whole love-in-a-day thing but the audiobook was good. Wouldn't really recommend though.

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Jul 20, 2016 Bee (Heart Full of Books) rated it it was ok

Shelves: standalones

I thought the whole thing was a little jumpy. It was a cute story but the important bits like Lucy's relationship with her parents and Owen's unresolved feelings about his mother's death never felt properly resolved. Also, L and O's break-ups with Liam and Paisley respectively were completely glossed over! If it was longer, and with more emotional detail, I think I would've liked it a heck of a lot more. I did, however, enjoy the banter even if I did see a pattern of repeating what each other ha ...more

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Goodreads Librari...: [FIXED] Please move this book to existing book (as a different edition). Also added to wrong author.	15	22	Dec 04, 2018 02:58AM
Contemporary YA: * The Geography of You and Me	1	14	May 23, 2017 12:39PM
YA Buddy Readers'...: The Geography of You and Me by- Jennifer E. Smith - Restarting October 1st 2016	149	167	Oct 09, 2016 10:30PM
Anyone currently reading this?	3	15	Apr 20, 2016 12:17PM
Goodreads Librari...: Book "missing"	2	18	Mar 07, 2016 02:46AM

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About Jennifer E. Smith

Jennifer E. Smith

6,568 followers

Jennifer E. Smith is the author of eight books for young adults, including WINDFALL and THE STATISTICAL PROBABILITY OF LOVE AT FIRST SIGHT. She earned her master's degree in creative writing from the University of St. Andrews in Scotland, and her writing has been translated into 33 languages.