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Belong to Me

(Love Walked In #2)

Marisa de los Santos (Goodreads Author)

3.86 · Rating details · 27,721 ratings · 3,616 reviews

Everyone has secrets. Some we keep to protect ourselves, others we keep to protect those we love.

A devoted city dweller, Cornelia Brown surprised no one more than herself when she was gripped by the sudden, inescapable desire to leave urban life behind and head for an idyllic suburb. Though she knows she and her beloved husband, Teo, have made the right move, s ...more

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Hardcover, 400 pages

Published April 1st 2008 by William Morrow (first published January 1st 2008)

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May 01, 2008 Lara rated it it was amazing

Shelves: for-harper-collins

I'm basically copying this from what I wrote on my blog, which is why it's so lengthy:

I thought this was positively delicious. And I’m not just saying that because I got the book for free, either. I’m not afraid to trash free stuff, you know (Hi there, Old Navy Jeans! You still suck!). I’m saying it because it really is lovely.

I first encountered Ms. de los Santos’s writing when I picked up her book Love Walked In off one of those tables at the megabookstore with the “buy I'm basically copying this from what I wrote on my blog, which is why it's so lengthy:

I thought this was positively delicious. And I’m not just saying that because I got the book for free, either. I’m not afraid to trash free stuff, you know (Hi there, Old Navy Jeans! You still suck!). I’m saying it because it really is lovely.

I first encountered Ms. de los Santos’s writing when I picked up her book Love Walked In off one of those tables at the megabookstore with the “buy 2 paperbacks for the price of 3″ signs or whatever. I don’t think I’ve ever hidden the fact that I am a sucker for an attractive book cover despite all proverbial advice not to choose one’s reading material (or anything else) that way, and the cover for Love Walked In spoke to me. Anyway, I ended up loving the book and was so pleased to learn that de los Santos was building further upon those characters with Belong to Me.

Reading Belong to Me is like walking around with one of those geared-towards-children “READING IS FUN!” posters pinned to your back. That’s what it is: pure, unadulterated fun. It is a 390-page reminder of why I love to read. It made me laugh, it made me cry, it made me roll my eyes at the questionable realism, it made me snort, it made me nod my head in agreement, and it made me want to jump into the pages and hang out with most of the characters and then it made me want to jump out of the pages and hang out with the author. I mean, sure, we read books sometimes because we want to be moved at our very core or because we want to feel intellectual or because we want to learn or because it won a Pulitzer or a Booker Prize or whatever. But sometimes we read to be entertained. Belong to Me does just that - and the best thing about it is that it does that without being too embarrassingly vapid or chick lit-ish.

It doesn’t hurt that I want to be friends with Cornelia Brown, the main character, either, despite the fact that she describes herself as weighing about the same as “your average sack of groceries” (I tend to resent thin people). I can get past that - easily - with her description of her first suburban dinner party:

“It was a pastel-colored prairie of linen pants and sleeveless tops, stretching in every direction as far as the eye could see. I stood on its edge and felt myself in my dress turning - subtly, like an early-autumn leaf or a days-old open bottle of red wine - from easy and elegant to overreaching and tarty.”

And then, later, as she so appropriately describes the way I feel at most events involving my in-laws:

“‘I’m good at dinner parties!’ I wanted to shout. ‘Dinner parties are my natural habitat! I am appropriately dressed and good at dinner parties!’”

Cornelia, honey, you’re not alone.

I don’t want to ruin the book for you by telling you much more, since I suck at keeping secrets and will inevitably overshare too much of the plot, but you should definitely read this. Set down War & Peace for a little bit and settle in for some scrumptiosity (a word, I promise!). And Ms. de los Santos, if you’re anything like Cornelia or Clare or any of your other characters (hell, even Piper-like-viper-but-with-a-p) and you’re up for a chat over too much wine, I’d be honored to join you. I can’t wait for your next book to come out. ...more

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Feb 22, 2012 smetchie rated it really liked it

Shelves: gave-me-an-ick-feeling, hippies-or-hate-or-lurking

3 stars? 4 stars? I'm not sure. Some of the writing is terrific. I mean really stop-you-in-your-tracks wonderful. Many lines struck me as so lovely I had to read them over and over.

And yet I'm just not sure how I felt about it overall.

The story is told in 3 different voices and I don't like that. Cornelia, a woman who has just moved from NYC to the suburbs, Piper, a woman of roughly the same age who lives in the neighborhood Cornelia moves to, and Deveraux, a 13-year-old genius boy 3 stars? 4 stars? I'm not sure. Some of the writing is terrific. I mean really stop-you-in-your-tracks wonderful. Many lines struck me as so lovely I had to read them over and over.

And yet I'm just not sure how I felt about it overall.

The story is told in 3 different voices and I don't like that. Cornelia, a woman who has just moved from NYC to the suburbs, Piper, a woman of roughly the same age who lives in the neighborhood Cornelia moves to, and Deveraux, a 13-year-old genius boy who moves to the same town from California with his single mom. (those are some names, huh?) Cornelia's voice, for no apparent reason, is in the first person. I suppose she's supposed to be the protagonist but we aren't treated to more of her intimate thoughts than the other voices, nor did I relate to her perspective any better. If anything, the first person voice is the least honest and intimate of the three. So maybe I don't understand the point of writing in first person. Perhaps there was some reason that went over my head. Or else maybe the author was just having trouble separating the 2 female perspectives. If it was the latter, I think she should have just scrapped the idea.

There is some serious woman-on-woman meanness in this book and, as a rule, that pisses me off. It perpetuates the notion that women are awful to each other. (You may say that's true and literature merely reflects it. But that doesn't mean I have to like it.) By the end you get to know the women better and understand why they're so catty. Sort of. Not really. You grow to like them in spite of their shitty behavior, let's say. A little. OK I didn't grow to like them but I think I was supposed to.

One of the subplots is a young mother of two who's dying of cancer. Some of those chapters I skimmed over, peeking out between my fingers, singing "La La La I Can't Hear You" in my head. Partly because I didn't want to cry on an airplane, which is where I read it, but mostly because it was just too close to home and I'm more of a head-in-the-sand type when it comes to horrible things I can't control.

It was a page-turner for sure. The story is compelling as hell and takes some very interesting twists and turns. Unfortunately, (view spoiler)

Jesus. Where am I going with this!?I only finished it late last night so maybe I'll come back in a week and adjust my rating.

I'm back already. Four stars. Definitely. I don't need a week. I think the fact that those things up there made me mad just proves that I cared and was invested and really liked it. ...more

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May 29, 2008 Roxy rated it it was ok

Shelves: general-fiction, are-you-gonna-make-me-cry

*sigh* finally finished it!! This book was a selection for my non-GR bookclub and not my choice. I'm not going to describe the story line because I suck at that so all you are getting, as usual, is my opinion.

The first half is difficult to read. The author loves to embellish everything. Paragraph upon paragraph of description of something that is not even that important to the storyline. I'd say she spends the first half of the book just describing the characters. I put the book down ...more

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Nov 06, 2008 Kim rated it really liked it · review of another edition

Shelves: contemporary

What a sweet story... really, with nice poetic references and beautiful, loving people that don't exist anywhere but in books like this. So, yeah... of course, I hate them.. Mostly because I'm that woman... the urbanite who moved to the suburbs and I'm that woman longing for the security blanket that is estrogen-induced friendship. Of course I didn't have the hot doctor husband and the financial security and BA in Art History, But, you know... those are really just the perks of the story, not the m ...more

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May 08, 2008 Julie-Ann rated it it was amazing

A great follow-up to "Love Walked In"... your favorite characters plus new ones to fall in love with! I just love De Los Santos's style of writing, it sucks me right in and I want to be friends with her characters. :)

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Nov 27, 2018 Lisa rated it liked it · review of another edition

[3+] A charming comfort read.

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Nov 06, 2017 Patricia rated it it was amazing · review of another edition

Shelves: giveaway, contemporary

I fell in love with BELONG TO ME. This novel is so beautifully written, and the character are so wonderfully described I felt I knew them. Only after I finished reading did I discover that the author's previous novel, LOVE WALKED IN, included a few of the same characters, and I'm now looking for a copy.

This novel contained quite a few memorable lines. The book was about family, friendship, lying to protect others - so many different things. I really hated when BELONG TO ME ended. I would not co ...more

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Sep 21, 2008 M rated it really liked it

I had bought both books together not knowing much about them, I didn't even realize they were connected (was actually afraid I had bought a collection of poetry by mistake) so I am happy I read them in the right order. This sequel is better than the first in a lot of ways - the characters have more edge, the plot is less predictable. While the premise (city girl moves to suburbs, insert cliched snarky lines about soccer moms in their SUVS baking muffins for the new neighbor while gossiping about I had bought both books together not knowing much about them, I didn't even realize they were connected (was actually afraid I had bought a collection of poetry by mistake) so I am happy I read them in the right order. This sequel is better than the first in a lot of ways - the characters have more edge, the plot is less predictable. While the premise (city girl moves to suburbs, insert cliched snarky lines about soccer moms in their SUVS baking muffins for the new neighbor while gossiping about her behind her back) is not in any way original, it was nice to at least meet some mean people in de los Santos' Sweet Valley world. However, this was another case of overblown characters (villains and heroes well defined) and what really annoyed me was her perpetuating her own weakness, as in, heroine is looking forward to an evening with a friend, but hastens to add, dont get me wrong, I love my husband with all my heart and soul and cherish every moment with him, I just needed some girl time. It's ok, Marisa, we weren't about to call in a relationship specialist or lose starry eyed love for your perfect man and woman with their perfect marriage (as is affirmed by every character who meets them) - in fact, not only is it normal for her to disentangle herself from her unbelievably (you got that right) good looking husband, but it would actually be refreshing if they existed in any mode other than inhumanly perfect - and while they do hit a rather large bump, it's still encased in plastic for the most part and seems removed from reality.
However, while the junior high maturity factor of every good character going to an ivy league while bad characters do not and all that was super irritating, I STILL really enjoyed reading it for its well paced and high quality talent as far as overall narrative and dialogue goes. In this book she does pull a lot of that Piccoult stuff that I cannot stand, setting the scene up to end with that perfect last line or clincher moment or whatever, but if you can roll your eyes past it it's a very enjoyable Shabbos afternoon read. ...more

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Sep 25, 2013 Sharon rated it liked it

Shelves: borrowed-from-library

Cornelia Brown and her husband Teo have been married for two years and decide they've had enough of city life. They find a a house in the suburbs in a nice neighbourhood.
Cornelia meets Piper Truitt who lives in the street. Piper is exactly the kind of person Cornelia was worried about meeting. Piper is a very picky type of person and is one for perfection and very judgemental.
Cornelia also meets Lake and her son Dev. Lake is a single mother who works as a waitress in a local restaura ...more

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Aug 03, 2017 Andrea rated it really liked it · review of another edition

Shelves: fiction

Well. This was downright lovely ❤ ...more

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Apr 20, 2013 Adira rated it liked it

Shelves: hispanic-authors, summer-reads, books-set-in-usa, chick-lit, romance, own-a-copy, series, books-about-characters-with-health, starcrossed-lovers, books-about-the-latin-america

Whenever I read one of Marisa de los Santos' novels, I just want to reach out and shake her and ask her, "WHY ARE YOU NOT WRITING POETRY ALREADY?!?" since de los Santos' writing style is flowery and drawn out. Her novels are filled with situations that should only take a few pages to write, but the author frequently takes her sweet time just describing situations that her characters get into or the characters' thought process to the readers often times wasting time to stop and explain some random detail that pops ...more

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Apr 09, 2008 Whitney rated it it was amazing

Loved, loved, loved, loved, loved LOVED this book. It was the kind of book that I would think about all day... dying to get home and pick it up again. I even started bringing it on my lunch break and reading it in the park-- I couldnt get enough! I can't remember the last book I read that I became so obsessed with.

You have to read Love Walked In before you read this one in order to truly fall head over heels in love with Teo, Cornelia, and Clare... and then in Belong to me you will fall MORE i ...more

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Aug 08, 2008 Valerie rated it really liked it · review of another edition

Belong to Me is the ultimate chick lit book, and as a bonus it's really well-written. I fell right into the story, and although I read the novel that preceded it (Love Walked In) I don't think it's absolutely necessary - a reader new to Marisa de los Santos could follow this novel just fine.

Back to the chick-lit categorization: it's just so girly. I can get into a girly book as well as the next girl, but I don't think this was written with men in mind (unless the men in question were the type(Love ...more

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May 18, 2009 Diane Chamberlain rated it it was amazing

I liked this sequel even more than the first, Love Walked In. de los Santos has a gift and I'm so glad she's sharing it with us!

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Mar 01, 2008 melanie (lit*chick) rated it really liked it

Utterly readable, even if you haven't read Love Walked In, this story stands alone. The author (a poet) has a lovely fluid style. She makes the reader privy to all of the private thoughts (and this is a VERY thoughtful bunch) and weaves it all together with just enough history and background that the story makes sense. And I especially enjoyed how it explored women's friendships - the work it takes to make friends in adulthood. So often characters are "lifelong" friends or fall easily into frien ...more

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May 27, 2008 MP rated it it was amazing

You know when you read a book about women that are friends..and these friends just all fit together in a perfect little group, well this isn't about those storybook friends. This book is about real people. The snob..free spirit..cancer patient..but you learn that really isn't who they are, there is much more to them and you realize how they can be friends..I'm 1/4 way into the book and I think I love these people more than most characters I've ever read. Marisa de los Santos writing is so fluid. ...more

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Oct 14, 2017 Kathryn rated it really liked it

Shelves: 4-star, women-s-fiction

At first I was resentful towards all the new characters in the story of Teo and Cornelia and Clare and then... I was hooked and I didn't want to leave them. Really enjoyed the read.

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Jun 17, 2019 Tiffany rated it it was ok

I liked the first book in this series more. A lot of the story line revolved around a new neighbor and her life and not as much about the characters from the first book. It was a bit slow for me. Although I'm glad I read it because there is some important character development included. I'm excited to read the 3rd book and see what happens to all the characters.

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Mar 24, 2013 Patty rated it really liked it

Shelves: 2013, friendship, new-york-city, motherhood, family, death-and-dying, love, fiction, women-writers, relationships

This is the second book I have read by Marisa de los Santos in less than six months. The only problem with this is that she has only written one other novel. I might have to save it for a special occasion.

As I noted with Falling Together, de los Santos writes about people that I would like to spend time with. They lead interesting lives and have a good sense of humor. They don't take themselves too seriously and it turns out that they make good friends. Because it is fiction, there are plenty o ...more

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Apr 15, 2008 Julie rated it it was amazing

Shelves: fiction

Cornelia, Teo, and Clare from Love Walked In return along with some other lovable (Dev) and questionable (Piper) characters, all of whose lives intersect in a most satisfying way.

In chapter 2, I was afraid this would be a common housewife story. By chapter 3, I liked the book. By chapter 9, I was in love with the story! And by chapter 15 I was up 2 hours past my bedtime trying to get to the end!

Another really good story with well-developed characters from Marisa de los Santos. (an ...more

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Sep 17, 2018 Jenni Moeller rated it liked it

3.5 I liked this more than the first, although it was slow at the beginning and am looking forward to the third book. I loved the character growth, honesty, different story lines, and humor. Aiden had me laughing out loud! I listened to the audiobook and it was very good.

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Dec 04, 2012 Gina rated it it was amazing

Shelves: romance, girlfriends, true-love, book-club, contemporary-fiction, psychology-women, women-s-fiction, family, health, friendship

Absolutely wonderful book about love in all of its forms. 5 stars!

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Aug 23, 2018 Judy rated it really liked it · review of another edition

Shelves: usa, fiction, 2018-reads

I thoroughly enjoyed this book. What I liked most was the positive tone throughout the book even though each character had crises in their lives that they had to work through. It was nice to read a book that was comfortable to read. (view spoiler) Cornelia was one of the nicest characters ever. I hope their will be a sequel.

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Aug 03, 2018 Michele rated it really liked it

Review to come

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Jun 10, 2018 Carol (Reading Ladies) rated it liked it

“Love can be a decision. Forgiveness, too.” I loved the themes of family, belonging, forgiveness, and inclusiveness, and for me this was better written than Love Walked In.
For more reviews visit my blog: readingladies.com

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Jun 28, 2017 Brittany Casteel rated it really liked it

This was my first Marisa de los Santos book and I adored her writing style. Her way with words is unbelievable and beautiful without being too much. This story was enjoyable and interesting and the characters were very likable and had depth.

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May 29, 2012 Anne rated it did not like it

Shelves: category-chick-lit

A devoted city dweller, Cornelia Brown surprised no one more than herself when she was gripped by the sudden, inescapable desire to leave urban life behind and head for an idyllic suburb. Though she knows she and her beloved husband, Teo, have made the right move, she approaches her new life with trepidation and struggles to forge friendships in her new home. Cornelia's mettle is quickly tested by judgmental neighbor Piper Truitt. Perfectly manicured, impeccably dressed, and possessing impossibl ...more

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Aug 05, 2008 Kristen rated it liked it

Shelves: goodfiction

This book isn't normally something I gravitate toward. It involves suburban housewives, happy families and fairly predictable plot "twists." It also treads dangerously close to the cliche theme of "love and friendship will prevail if we just learn to forgive." Clearly de los Santos' wanted the book's legacy to be uplifting and tidy. That's okay--it just isn't normally my style.

BUT!

I still enjoyed it a good deal. I really liked the main character and found de los Santos' prose believ ...more

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Jun 09, 2010 Tania rated it it was amazing · review of another edition

Shelves: fiction

Even though there were unimpressed cycnics in the room last night when we discussed this in book group, I LOVED THIS BOOK. It's magical and insightful and helps you believe in the innate goodness of mankind again. de los Santos writes as an omniscient narrator inside the heads of three people (one of whom is written in the 1st person while the other two are in 3rd person--an interesting narrative device!): a young married urbanite recently moved to suburbia, her imperious wickedly judgmental nei ...more

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Apr 17, 2008 Karma Hope rated it it was amazing

I LOVED this book! In many ways the plot was unoriginal - finding your true self by not being afraid to deviate from social norms and expectations, women learning to get past stupid assumptions and biases, etc. Sometimes the writing verged on arrogant; either over simplifying the complex or alternately making the simple complex. BUT, then she would put words to a feeling or thought that I didn't even realize I felt or had thought! Her descriptions of motherhood were so beautiful and stunningly t ...more

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Madison Mega-Mara...: # 64 Belong to Me	1	3	Jul 11, 2014 03:54AM
Cover to Cover Bo...: February 2014 book - Belong to Me	5	19	Mar 15, 2014 03:54PM
RGV Book Junkies : My Book Sharing Policy	1	4	Mar 10, 2013 03:00PM
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About Marisa de los Santos

Marisa de los Santos

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Marisa de los Santos is the New York Times bestselling author of LOVE WALKED IN, BELONG TO ME, FALLING TOGETHER, THE PRECIOUS ONE, and her newest novel, which continues with characters from the first two, I'LL BE YOUR BLUE SKY.

Marisa has also co-authored, with her husband David Teague, two novels for middle grade readers: SAVING LUCAS BIGGS and CONNECT THE STARS.

Marisa and David live ...more