When Addie La Rue makes a pact with the devil, she trades her soul for immortality. But there's always a price - the devil takes away her place in the world, cursing her to be forgotten by everyone.
Addie flees her tiny home town in 18th-Century France, beginning a journey that takes her across the world, learning to live a life where no one remembers her and everything she owns is lost and broken. Existing only as a muse for artists throughout history, she learns to fall in love anew every single day.
Her only companion on this journey is her dark devil with hypnotic green eyes, who visits her each year on the anniversary of their deal. Alone in the world, Addie has no choice but to confront him, to understand him, maybe to beat him.
Until one day, in a second hand bookshop in Manhattan, Addie meets someone who remembers her. Suddenly thrust back into a real, normal life, Addie realises she can't escape her fate forever.
Review -
This is the first V. E. Schwab book that I have ever read and honestly, it just blew me away! This book has a very unique, heart-breaking, unforgettable storyline. The writing is poetic, thought provoking and brilliant. I had to take a really long break after reading this because this book gave me a hangover kind of feeling and I was at a loss of words for describing this masterpiece (and also because I had exams upcoming as well).
The story is about a French countryside girl named Addie LaRue, who makes a deal with the devil to escape from her forced wedding. The devil grants her freedom and immortality but also gives her a curse. A curse to be forgotten by everybody the moment she is out of their eyesight. But after about 300 years of search , she finally meets Henry, an unremarkable boy working in a small second-hand bookstore, who remembers her. How and why he remembers her forms the later part of the story.
The starting part of the book was slow and a bit boring. But the story gains pace as we move on. The story takes places over two timelines: the past and the present. The past shows how and why Addie made a deal with the devil and how her relationship with him evolved over the past 300 years. The present timeline is about her encounter with Henry and his background story. I did like Henry but I still felt as if Henry and Addie's relationship was a bit forced (while I absolutely loved Addie and Luc's relationship). I wish there was more of development of their relationship.
The narration made me hooked on the characters (except the starting part). Some parts were so heartbreaking and I was able to feel strongly for the characters as they were very relatable (except Addie's immortality). The story conveys the power of art and the importance of mental health. And the ending just left me so mesmerized that I immediately gave this book five stars. Even though, there are some flaws as I had mentioned above, I was able to look past them at the masterpiece of a story (and it was totally worth it). In fact, I was able to identify the flaws only after scratching my head for almost a week (due to which I changed my rating to four).
Overall, I highly recommend this unforgettable, memorable novel.
Wow! What a book cover
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