Book: P.S. I Still Love You
Author: Jenny Han
Genre: YA Contemporary
Rating: ★★★★ (and a half)
“There’s a Korean word my grandma taught me. It’s called jung. It’s the connection between two people that can’t be severed, even when love turns to hate. You still have those old feelings for them; you can’t ever completely shake them loose of you; you will always have tenderness in your heart for them.”
If you’re reading this review I’m assuming you’ve already read To All The Boys I’ve Loved Before, so there’ll be quite a few spoilers in this review. Now, if you haven’t read To All The Boys I’ve Loved Before and plan on reading this review anyways, you’ve been warned.
There are SO many things I want to talk about in this review but I’m gonna try and be more civilized and start by where we left off in the first book.
We left off during that awkward off period between Lara Jean and Peter, specifically with her beginning to write a love letter to Peter, so the book started with Lara Jean finishing the letter and taking it to Peter’s house. As soon as Lara Jean and Peter K got back together my immediate reaction was, “wait, what?! They’re getting back together that quickly?!” and I came to the early conclusion that this book was going to be filled with unnecessary problems because a contemporary novel can never just be peaches and cream. Entertaining, but still rather unnecessary. I mean, I was obviously happy that they got back together, but it was too soon, in my opinion.
Then, just as I predicted, BOOM! The whole video scandal crap. Coming up constantly. Throughout the whole book. I was getting frustrated, okay? I think what annoyed me the most about this is that Genevieve WAS in fact the one who did it and still Peter kept defending her, to the point where it actually damaged their relationship. I guess it was actually necessary for the book to have rocky paths and stuff, but it still annoyed me to infinity and beyond.
THE OTHER THING that I didn’t enjoy at all was… GENEVIEVE! Okay no, as much as I hated Genevieve, it was actually the fact that Lara Jean was being rather childish, at least when it came to Peter, or Genevieve, or the video thing. With Peter, she kept getting mad at him or second guessing him for the stupidest things. For example, if Peter didn’t give a certain answer when she said this or that, she just immediately assumed that he wasn’t content with her. It was so, so stupid. And with the video thing, she just kept bringing it back up, again and again. Like yeah, I understand it’s quite horrifying, but it happened. You can’t really erase the past, can you? I don’t know. I love Lara Jean, but she got annoying from time to time.
Now, those are pretty much all the things I didn’t enjoy about this book. Enough of the things I didn’t like and onto the things I loved.
Speaking of things I loved, let’s just take a moment to indulge in everything that is John Ambrose McLaren. John Ambrose McClaren. *sighs* He’s the sweetest little shit to ever walk the faze of the earth. Peter Kavinsky is the guy girls would fantasize about, but John Ambrose McClaren is exactly the type of guy they’d dream of actually dating. He’s such a dorky sweetheart, and he pays attention to the little details (AHEM, the snow globe) and my heart just swells up at the thought of him. You know how I said I’m trash for Peter K in my review of To All The Boys I’ve Loved Before? Well scratch that, I’m actually trash for John Ambrose McClaren. I grew so attached, and fell in love with this character so much that I’m not sure I actually wanted Lara Jean to end up with Peter anymore. My OTP may or may not have morphed from Lara Jean and Peter K to Lara Jean and John Ambrose McClaren. Oops, sorry not sorry.
Thinking about John Ambrose McClaren like…
*swoon*
I was gonna write about something else but I just cant let go the subject of John Ambrose McClaren. He was literally my favorite thing in the whole entire book. OH, AND HIS GRANDMA! STORMY! STORMY WAS THE BOMB DIGGITY! I loved her character so much, she made me laugh so, so hard. I wanted to keep her as my pet. Except that you can’t actually own a person as a pet, so maybe I just wanted her to be my grandma too.
I really liked the whole thing with Lara Jean’s dad and Ms. Rothchild. I thought it was very cute that Kitty kept trying to set them up, and how awkward they were with each other, regardless of the fact that they’re adults.
I also really loved Peter K’s relationship with Kitty. I think it was the cutest thing ever the way he shared this bond with his girlfriend’s little sister, so strong that even when they “weren’t together” he still looked out for her and all that.
The way the book ended was kind of satisfying for me, but at the same time I was really hoping that Lara Jean would end up with John Ambrose McClaren. Soooooo, yeah. *shrugs* It was not bad, by any means, it was great. I loved reading more about these characters once again. The thing is I had incredibly high expectations for this book and it didn’t quite meet them. Again, I enjoyed the book (I certainly enjoyed John Ambrose McClaren) but I prefer the first one.
I’d love to know what your opinion on this book is, to see if you agree or disagree with me, or see what your general thoughts on this book are, as I’ve heard a lot of mixed opinions about it.
Anywaaaaaaays, I’m going to close off this review by saying one thing and one thing only… JOHN AMBROSE MCCLAREN!
the reader's compass 