*This does contain some spoilers*

It Starts With Us is a sequel to the book It Ends With Us that surrounds the main character, Lily Bloom, and the direction of her life after her breakup with Ryle, her abusive ex. Colleen Hoover, the author, expands on the new found relationship between Lily and her young love, Atlas, while in the process of letting go of Ryle. Balancing work, family, and relationships, this book is told through Lily and Atlas’s perspectives as they grow closer and face challenges together.

As read in the previous book, Ryle has a hard time being aware of others and his surroundings. Being selfish and making situations a lot more exaggerated than they should be, was a bad habit he formed. He still very much wants to be a part of Lily’s life, and Lily does not want to take that away from him, mainly because of their daughter, Emerson (Emmy for short), but she fears that his temper towards her will lead to her daughter receiving the same anger and impatience from him overtime. Lily is scared for Emmy’s future and even having a civil conversation with Ryle about certain rules in place for their dynamic, gives her anxiety.

Lily tries to distance herself as much as she can from him and after an encounter with Atlas, they soon get back in touch. Atlas has always been in love with Lily waiting for her, growing his business, and ignoring his past. But having her back in his world enlightens his life, reliving and relearning everything about each other. Lily feels the same but convinced herself to be precautious and take things slow to be aware of Ryle and his reaction to them being together. Hoover shows a side of Atlas not seen before and takes the audience down a sad road as to why he didn’t have home when he was younger and his emotions and thoughts when he met Lily. Lily falls in love with Atlas all over again, thinking of him as “considerate Atlas”.

The conflict and plot overall of the story drags out a little but still makes the story good enough to read. Personally, I did not like this book as much as the first one, it was more of a slower pace. The first book got so much attention that Hoover felt she needed to come out with a sequel. It was dry but I wanted to finish the book, even though you can pretty much predict the ending of it from the start. There was so much detail leading up to the relationship with Lily and Atlas that by the end it felt rushed. Yet I would still recommend this series as there are still unexpected twists and some chapters were definitely more intriguing than others.

It Starts With Us by Colleen Hoover is available to check out from the Mission Viejo Library. It is also available to download for free from Libby.