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My Thoughts

An emotional journey fraught with desire, angst and secrets that consume. A story about feeling too much and too deeply that you don’t feel at all. Bold and beautifully written, this is a different side of Colleen Hoover … one you won’t soon forget.

• Related Posts: 2014 Favorites | 2014 Favorite Singles | Emotional Powerhouses | Colleen Hoover Reading Orders
• Ugly Love: Amazon | Barnes & Noble | iTunes

Synopsis

When Tate Collins meets airline pilot Miles Archer, she doesn’t think it’s love at first sight. They wouldn’t even go so far as to consider themselves friends. The only thing Tate and Miles have in common is an undeniable mutual attraction. Once their desires are out in the open, they realize they have the perfect set-up. He doesn’t want love, she doesn’t have time for love, so that just leaves the sex. Their arrangement could be surprisingly seamless, as long as Tate can stick to the only two rules Miles has for her.

Never ask about the past. 
Don’t expect a future.

They think they can handle it, but realize almost immediately they can’t handle it at all.

Hearts get infiltrated. 
Promises get broken. 
Rules get shattered.
Love gets ugly.

My Review

There’s something special that happens when you come across a book that immediately prickles your skin. A recognition that it’s the type you’ll inevitably fall in love with.  The kind that draws you in with every emotionally-charged moment, with every carefully selected word, with every feeling it ignites. And before you know it, you’re consumed by the story. Heart and soul devoured by it. Drowning in it. And when it’s a story so ugly, so raw, so misshapen by hurt, it feels as if the story will swallow you whole…

That was my experience reading this book.

“Ugly love becomes you. Consumes you.”

Colleen Hoover once again proves she’s a master storyteller in her best and boldest work to date. She pens the novel in a unique and thematically symbolic format that renders a one-of-a-kind fluidity and motion to how the story ebbs and flows. How it recedes. How it crests and surges with every emotionally charged moment as Miles reluctantly falls in love with Tate, and in turn, how Tate falls for Miles despite his best efforts to keep her away. Their story isn’t typical, but it’s one that is all about feeling. Feeling too little and feeling too much. Feeling so much that you shut down and feeling not enough that you hurt others. And despite the fact that their coming together isn’t a fairytale, it shows that sometimes a happily ever after costs a great many tears and heartache. That beautiful, forever love can come from ugly, broken love… if you just believe in a person enough to not give up.

“Love ain’t always pretty, Tate. Sometimes you spend all your time hoping it’ll eventually be something different. Something better.  Then before you know it, you’re back to square one and you lost your heart somewhere along the way.”

When nurse-in-training Tate Collins moves in with her brother temporarily, she never expected to meet Miles Archer—a striking, blue-eyed, unpredictable boy whose presence fills an entire room. Despite his desultory attitude, she was able to see feeling and pain and secrets behind the stormy blue of his eyes. There was more to him than he led on and she couldn’t help but be drawn to him. But love was impossible for Miles. It could never happen. It shouldn’t.

“It’s not that I don’t like you, Tate… I just don’t want to like you. I don’t want to like anyone. I don’t want to date anyone. I don’t want to love anyone.”

Tate’s feelings intensify nonetheless. Each time he smiles. Each time he’s kind. Each time he touches her… that undeniable, ever-present connection beckons. And even though he’s cold one minute and hot the other, she suspects he feels something real too. Desire grows as confusion consumes, but finally a creative arrangement gives them a mutually beneficial outlet. They agree to a physical relationship bound by rules, but devoid of any hope for more and stripped of any real emotion.

“Don’t ask about my past. And never expect a future.”

Miles defines complexity. A well-worn armor masks emotions, hides a past. We get to know him gradually, moment by moment. Upon first meeting him, he seems hardened, callous, uncaring, but we also get the sense that he’s been through something life-changing. Life-taking. Because now, in the present, he seems bereft of it. Living but not really living. Numb and simply going through the motions.

The entire story alternates between present and past tense, allowing us to experience the different sides of Miles. The juxtaposition between the two versions is striking, and as a reader, I desperately sought to bridge the chasm between the two personas. What happened???

“If I were capable of loving someone… it would be you.”

The story centers on their struggles to understand their feelings for the other. Tate must battle whether Miles’ sometimes hurtful actions are worth it. Is he worth it? And Miles must reconcile his past and decipher his own feelings before it’s too late. I loved the buildup of emotion as these two people fell in love. I could feel myself filling up up up with desperate hope and possibility. It was all such a visceral experience. So many emotions. So many ups and downs. So many feels. All wonderfully chaotic.

“… he kills me. Or he kisses me. I can’t tell which, since I’m pretty sure they would feel the same. His lips against mine feel like everything. Like living and dying and being reborn, all at the same time.”

And goodness, when the truth is finally revealed, IT. IS. UGLY. Gut wrenching. Shattering. I was breathless. In tears. Everything fell into place. I got it.

Every Colleen Hoover book is a challenge. At the first flip of the page, I ask myself… Can this story actually trump the one before? Will it be as good? As powerful? As creative? Will I fall in love? What will she do differently? How can she do it again and again and again AND AGAIN? Can she really?

She can and she does.

Ugly Love delivers a reading experience rife with heart and hurt. Quiet in agony and loud with emotions. Expect to feel everything. It’s no secret that Colleen Hoover is one of my favorite authors. For me, she’s the best storyteller out there now. And with each book I read, each character I connect with, I am more in awe of her talent as each deceptively simple word—string of words—suddenly has the power to shatter me in ways I didn’t think possible. I couldn’t have loved this story more. ♥

“It’s intense. It’s heartbreaking. It’s devastating. It’s ugly.”

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