Page 14 - JAN 2025

Page 14
Community
By: BRittaNy amalfi
NEWFOUNDLAKELIFE.COM January 2025
Happy New Year, everyone! A new year means a whole new slot of book reviews, and I’m ec- static to start 2025 with The Seven Husbands of Evelyn Hugo, written by Taylor Jenkins Reed. I first heard about this book on the in- famous “BookTok,” or, in other terms, book-reviewers on the TikTok app. The Seven Husbands of Evelyn Hugo took the world by storm, so much so that there is, evidently, a television series being made. And, of course, the moment I hear about a book-to- screen adaption, I have to see what all of the hype is about, and I’m so glad I did. To be honest, I’m a little mad at my- self that I waited to jump on the
Evelyn Hugo hype train.
Taylor Jenkins Reed is a pop-
ular author known primarily for Daisy Jones and the Six and The Seven Husbands of Evelyn Hugo. A while back, I wrote a review for Daisy Jones, which was a book I positively fell in love with. Reed’s writing style and story execution truly pull readers in and are what I would describe as “an intriguing page-turner.” I fell in love with the way Reed executes her stories— by setting them up in two different but connected timelines.
The Seven Husbands of Evelyn Hugo tells the story of Evelyn Hugo, a legendary Hollywood starlet now 79 years old, as she shares her life’s secrets in a final
interview with an unknown journalist, Monique Grant. As Evelyn tells Monique her story, the reader is instantly immersed in Evelyn’s world, giving us a front-row seat to everything that made this Hollywood phenom- enon a mystery wrapped inside an amazing actress.
Of course, Taylor Jenkins Reed is known for keeping the reader guessing until the very end. She sets up the mystery: Why did Evelyn Hugo choose Monique, an unknown jour- nalist, to tell her life story? This leaves the reader wondering: Is there a connection between Ev- elyn and Monique? And if there is, could it change Monique’s life forever?
The Seven Husbands of Evelyn Hugo is everything a good book should be: engaging, captivating, and emotion-invoking. Hugo herself is one of the most com- plex characters I have ever read, and yet by the end of it, she was just a human. And that goes to show how fascinating someone’s life story genuinely can be. The
general intrigue that surrounds Hugo is what drives this story forward to an earth-shattering ending. After all, who wouldn’t be intrigued by a woman with seven husbands and the stories behind each one?
Each husband of Hugo gets their own chapter, and every one is vastly different, which, in my opinion, adds to the nu- ance of the story. Evelyn Hugo is a woman who knows what she wants, and does whatever she has to to get it. Once her mother
died when Evelyn was a young girl, and living with her dead- beat father in poverty, an ambi- tious Hugo was determined to get out and become someone. Having been an intelligent teen- ager and being extremely aware of the beautiful looks she was blessed with, Evelyn Hugo set her sights on becoming a Hol- lywood actress, and that’s pre- cisely what she did.
Evelyn’s story, as recounted to Monique, traces her journey from her youth to her pres- ent as the successful 79-year- old woman, now sitting across from Monique in that room. The depth of her story is what had me crying my eyes out by the end, and as I learned more about Evelyn Hugo as I read, I realized she was the type of character who made choices that the readers would be con- flicted about. And, of course, Evelyn’s story comes with a lot of secrets that she reveals to Mo- nique.
The Seven Husbands of Evelyn Hugo is a must-read, complex story that invokes every emotion you could possibly have. It’s cap- tivating, light-hearted, powerful, and absolutely heartbreaking. This isn’t a book that anyone should miss, so if you’re looking for a story that leaves you reeling by the very end, Evelyn Hugo is not known to disappoint.
Book of the Month: The Seven Husbands of Evelyn Hugo by Taylor Jenkins Reed
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