Rising author Libby Page released her sixth novel, “This Book Reminds Me of You,” on Feb. 3. The novel serves as a one year snapshot of protagonist Tilly Nightingale after the death of her husband, traveling through the grieving process of a young, English editor.
Page often explores the themes of memory, loss and love through her novels and poetry. “This Book Reminds Me of You” follows that pattern. Tilly Nightingale receives a call on the first New Year’s after her husband passes away, inviting her to the local bookstore to pick up a book from her beloved Joe.
Before her husband passed, he chose 12 books for Tilly, one for each month of the year after he passed away. Along with each book is a letter from Joe detailing why he chose the book, some of his regrets and all the reasons he loved Tilly.
Throughout the novel, the reader learns Tilly and Joe’s past through heartwrenching flashbacks. Grief is often accompanied by regret and the constant presence of one’s loss. Tilly’s inner monologue does a wonderful job bringing the audience through her journey navigating memories.
Joe leaves Tilly novels with settings in the places they had always talked about visiting: A novel about Paris, a story in New York and even a beach story accompanied with a fully planned three-week vacation in Bali, which is where they were going to have their honeymoon before his cancer diagnosis.
If the goal of a great novel is to break the reader’s heart and make them fall in love, Page does a wonderful job. The story begins in a somber, depressing tone with a passive narrator, but it shifts slowly as Tilly is beautifully reborn, a woman ready to be active in her own life again.
But not each book is a novel; a cookbook and a camping manual bringing out sides of Tilly she never discovered before. Tilly finds herself hosting the first dinner party since Joe’s death and going on a bike trip through Scotland to reconnect with a friend she lost touch with.
While some of the chapters feel a bit slow, the book’s character development displays growth difficult to display in a standalone novel. Tilly reconciles the faults that created rifts between her and Joe, showing how people can change after the loss of a loved one, for better and worse.
Throughout the novel, the author also gives the reader recommendations related to the types of books Tilly received, breaking the fourth wall and bringing the story into reality. One month, Joe gives her a book full of poetry to help express emotional experiences. In turn, the bookshop ad at the beginning of the chapter lists four books under the theme “Poetry books for every feeling.”
In the end, “This Book Reminds Me of You” is less about the books Joe leaves behind and more about what they allow Tilly to carry forward. Page reminds us that love lingers through memory, habit and growth. Healing does not mean forgetting, but learning how to live alongside what has been lost. The novel does a wonderful job bringing the reader into the story, showing how characters grow, and giving the reader plenty to read and think about long after the last page has been turned.
