France, 1714: in a moment of desperation, a young woman makes a Faustian bargain to live forever and is cursed to be forgotten by everyone she meets.Thus begins the extraordinary life of Addie LaRue, and a dazzling adventure that will play out across centuries and continents, across history and art, as a young woman learns how far she will go to leave her mark on the world.But everything changes when, after nearly 300 years, Addie stumbles across a young man in a hidden bookstore and he remembers her name.
Quotes:
- What is a person, if not the marks they have behind?
- You want to be loved. You want to be enough.
- But that's the thing, Henry, you haven't been you. You waste so much time in people who don't deserve you. People who don't know you, because you don't let them know you.
- Because time is cruel to all, and crueler still to artists. Because vision weakens, voices wither, and talent fades. "He leans close and twists a lock of her hair around one finger. "Because happiness is brief and history is lacking, and in the end," he says, "everyone wants to be remembered. "
- It is difficult, however, to play a winning hand when everyone who comes to the table already knows what cards you are holding.
Personal Opinion:
Maybe I’m a little late to the hype of The Invisible Life of Addie LaRue, but late or not, it’s a book that fascinated me. Not only for having such an original idea but also for being written in such a melancholic way, full of emotions, and expressing that feeling of loneliness.
Addie is a French girl who lives in 1714, and in a moment of desperation, she makes a pact with one of the gods who only respond at night. They warned her not to do it, but her anxiety leads her to wish for something that will make her live for over three hundred years on Earth.
Addie asks the dark god to stop her forced marriage so she can live a free life, not realizing that this will make her immortal. It will cause her to wander for many years with no possibility of being remembered. Everyone she meets, interacts with, will forget her the moment she moves away from them. Except for one person: Henry.
After centuries, Henry is the only one who says the phrase: "I remember you."
The novel jumps through time. It starts in 1700 and goes back to 2014. While on one side, we see how Addie makes her wish and wanders alone for centuries, each chapter that follows takes us back to 2014, where we follow Addie meeting Henry, trying to answer the question of why he is the only one who remembers her.
The novel reflects many emotions that are not necessarily tied to Addie’s situation, and I think that’s the most important point of the entire work: the power of meeting people, leaving a mark, letting them go, but still feeling alone. From Henry’s perspective, it also touches on the theme of wanting to be truly loved. It’s true that some people are attracted to us because they see something in us that draws them in or that they’re looking for, but in reality, we hope they love us for who we are, for what we can offer, rather than what people expect from us.
V.E. Schwab’s prose is engaging, and the sense of loneliness she describes within its pages is striking. In several scenes, I felt that the atmosphere created by the author gave me a perfect idea of how lonely Addie felt, and at times, I even identified with wanting to be surrounded by people who appreciated me for who I am.
I almost gave this book five stars on Goodreads, but I didn’t because, near the end, V.E. Schwab made a plot twist that I saw coming and didn’t fully convince me. Also, I feel like the last chapters were loaded with deliberately melancholic descriptions (which I don’t blame, given the entire theme of the book). Still, the last few pages become a bit heavy to read due to the weight of sentimentality. I’m thinking of waiting a while to see if a second reading makes me view this final part with fresh eyes.
In the end, I believe The Invisible Life of Addie LaRue is one of the best books I’ve read recently, and I’m already keeping an eye on the author’s other works.
Have you guys read it yet?
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