I loved this book! Don't let the cemetery, deaths, and adultery put you off from this book. This is a book about life and love in all of its forms. It is a sensual book in that it fills your senses completely - you see the scenery, you feel the ocean, you taste the fresh simple food, you hear the music (there is even a Spotify playlist of the songs mentioned), and it touches your heart with the full range of emotions. It is a book of contradictions - there is death but there is life and new growth, there is hurt but there is healing, there is hate but also love, there is loneliness but also close friendships, and there are tears but also laughter.

This is a book that is meant to be savored. It will move you. The main character reads a journal throughout the novel and her thoughts when she finishes it sum up how I feel about this book: "I close Irene's journal with a heavy heart. The way one closes a novel one has fallen in love with. A novel that's a friend from whom it's hard to part, because one wants it close by, in arm's reach."