It Ends with Us

I didn't read the summary for this book or any reviews--I just read it on hype alone--but this book's entire foundation is abuse and suicide trigger warnings, so please proceed with caution.

Both Lily and Ryle are traumatized people with terrible decision-making skills which, fine, who isn't? But this book tries to make the abuser sympathetic and (arguably) a victim himself, which definitely made me feel a certain type of way.

People can experience a garbage life and still choose not to hurt other people. No matter how much an abuser paints themselves as a victim, they *choose* abuse every single time no matter how many times they gaslight and apologize. And yet the author tries to rewrite that naked truth why? So Lily can decide to keep her abuser's baby, and invite him back into her life so they can divorce and still co-parent together?

All of Ryle's "redeeming" qualities are constantly repeated ad nauseum to maybe illustrate Lily's unprocessed childhood trauma masquerading as love? Or the author trying to convince us that telling an abuser they're a father will magically be their come-to-Jesus moment.

Lily is blind to and then habitually ignores red flags, and Ryle can't stop waving them around from that first moment. That's when I knew this book would mean a lot of heavy sighing and face-palming.

Then enter Elisa, enabler extradinaire, who likely knows everything about her brother but says nothing until it's almost too late. I find that hard to believe. I almost stopped reading at the cafe scene about the older brother.

The book is written well enough, although the repetition of phrases like "and just like that", Ryle's scrubs, etc. were grating.

Lily and Atlas kept me reading. They were the most well-rounded and believable characters, but the rest of the book was a big yikes. The flashbacks added to the story instead of detracted.

But, I can't shake how apologetic the author is about this abuser. The ending seemed paper-thin and left me on edge.

One of the worst books I have ever read. It was alright at start but it was such a fast descent to trash. Like forgiving the abuse was bad enough but having a baby with the abuser and having to deal with him. God what a shitty novel.

I get it's inspired from the authors life but still doesn't make these things right.The abuser is based on the author's father, so obviously she will try to paint down the issue. But it's so unacceptable. The novel borderline romanticise abuse.

Like in real life you most would run and never look back. The novel shouldn't give message like being this forgiving, and breaking the cycle should have had removing the person from your life too.

One good thing the book did is it's making me appreciate other booktok books. I think that it could be so much worse.