A lost young man meets a girl, falls in love, and his life changes forever.

William Waters lived a life of solitude with his parents, who were marked by tragedy and forever changed. They never could quite accept William as their son, as his entry into the world was marked by the death of his older sister. When his parents looked at William, they saw his sister who died just days after he was born. So, they simply stopped looking at him.

William adapted to this lonely life and soon came to expect the quiet. He migrated to the sport of basketball, an activity in which he found he could largely play by himself at the park. When a group of boys invited him to play alongside them, he found a new joy in working as a team. He built this joy into a forever passion, and soon became a star athlete. He earned a scholarship to Northwestern and began a new life in college.

In this new life, he met Julia Padavano. Julia is a headstrong, opinionated young woman who helped to define William and give him a direction on how to move forward. William immediately fell into a state of comfort, with Julia leading him on his path to the future: engagement, graduation, marriage, career and children.

William is brought into Julia’s boisterous family, consisting of 3 sisters and two parents. He becomes comfortable with Julia’s sister and grows to love his newfound relationships. However, despite his growth and comfort, things are changing a little too fast for William. He soon finds himself spiraling out of control and slowly things begin to fall apart.

The path of this novel takes some turns I never saw coming! William’s struggles with his emotions and mental health were written in a perfect manner, that brought us into his mindset and showed a very true, dark side of depression. It also gave hope in the ability to overcome this illness, if treated and acknowledged.

We hear the point of views of William, Julia and Julia’s closest sister, Sylvie. Each perspective adds a tremendous amount to this story.

William is stoic, straight forward and difficult to excite. His best friend and basketball teammates tend to add some humor and color to his chapters. We watch William grow from a lonely young boy to a mature, fulfilled man learning to accept himself.

Julia is a strong, confident woman who does not question what she wants, only the most direct pathway to get to her final destination. She is motivated to a point of almost selfishness, and sees what she chooses to see. In the beginning, she is a truly likeable character with a bit of charm. As the novel progresses, though, she begins to take a turn more towards selfish intentions and tunnel vision.

Sylvie is Julia’s best friend and closest confidant. They share everything; secrets, dreams, a bedroom and everything in between. While Julia is headstrong and straightforward, Sylvie tends to have her head in a book (often reading poetry) and dreams big. The role Sylvie plays in this novel took me by surprise. I never saw a few of her actions coming and it was a remarkable twist to the story.

The book moves forward at a good pace, with wonderful character development. It had a good balance of very likeable characters (Emmi hit the mark for me, I loved her!) and those that had difficult traits to swallow. As heart-wrenching of a story as it was, it hit on very real points that affect people every day. Unexpected deaths, fractured relationships, clinical depression… these real instances make this book incredibly relatable.

This beautifully written family drama will leave you reeling! It was impactful, full of plot twists and achingly emotional.