While her style can be at times repetitive and her delivery is occasionally amateurish, Ahern deserves credit for a spirited first effort. If PS, I Love You is any indication of this author's talent, readers have much to look forward to as Ahern matures as a novelist and a storyteller. --Gisele Toueg

Product Description
Featured Alternate of the Literary Guild, Book-of-the-Month Club, and Doubleday Book Club

When her high school sweetheart and beloved husband, Gerry, dies at 30, Holly doesn't know how to go on without him - nor does she want to. But two months after his death, Holly receives a mysterious package and opens it to find that Gerry has left her a letter for each of the next ten months. Following the instructions in the letters ultimately shows Holly a much larger world than the one she's been forced to leave behind.

Holly and Gerry were the perfect couple. Not sickening perfect, but perfect for one another. And so when Gerry dies of a brain tumor, Holly feels utterly lost and depressed, staying in her apartment and deteriorating. Finally she emerges from her cocoon, but still isn't ready to reembrace life. Despite the efforts of her family and friends, she can't move on.

Then she receives a package from beyond the grave: the List. Gerry wrote it before his death, leaving her instructions to do things like buy a bedside lamp, sing karaoke, and ends every note with "PS, I love you." Holly obeys the List -- sometimes happily, sometimes reluctantly -- and her new experiences help her to remember the past, while looking to the future.

"PS I Love You" is not your typical chick-lit. Sure, it has most of the usual trappings -- a young woman out in the world, the loud'n'lovable gay confidante, the outspoken best friend, the eccentric family complete with pink-haired baby sister. But there's no gooey love story with some new Hot Guy Du Jour, nor does it avoid the darker, more depressing experiences.

Ahern's writing is the sort that will be excellent when she gets a bit more writing experience. It's almost painfully awkward in places, the sort of thing that normally gets smoothed over by editors. But she has plenty of talent -- she makes the settings and characters come alive. And she knows how to mix grieving and humor, without making the humor less funny or the grief less heart-tugging.

Holly herself is a likable character, very true to life and sympathetic. Her family seems a little too bizarre at times, but weirdly enough, we all knows jerks, freaks and lovables like this. Worse, we're related to some of them. And Gerry himself, despite being dead, is one of the more intriguing personalities in the book even if he only appears in Holly's memory.

Ahern needs to work on her sometimes-awkward writing style, but her humorous, melancholy slice of chick-lit is a sweet read, especially for anyone who has had to say goodbye, and "PS I Love You."


Immature   February 5, 2004
 26 out of 46 found this review helpful

I bought this book, the premise sounded like something I would really like. I also noticed some pretty good reviews.I was very surprised at how much I didn't like it. I couldn't even get through the whole book. The writing was immature and shallow, and very repetitive. Maybe I am too old for the type of book, although I do like some of the new "chick lit". I am going to send it to someone else, and let her try it, maybe it was just me.Anyway, if you are reading this review, maybe you should try to get a copy from the library, or borrow one, or even wait for paper. I hate writing bad reviews, I would just rather not say anything at all,but here it is with apologies to the author.


Deeper than chick lit, not quite literature...   June 15, 2005
 21 out of 23 found this review helpful

I read this book at a very rapid pace and found myself alternately smiling and tearing up throughout. It's the story of how a widow, left too soon by a husband who died of cancer too young, survives the first year of widowhood and slowly comes back to life, helped along by a monthly letter and surprise left behind by her husband. It reminded me of a Maeve Binchy novel with a younger, more urban sensibility. Excellent beach read, if you don't mind getting a bit choked up on the beach...


powerful character study   February 1, 2004
 16 out of 24 found this review helpful

Holly and Gerry met through mutual friends while still in junior high school. They became sweethearts as both recognized that they had met their soul mate. Eventually they married. He promised Holly that if he ever left her, he would leave her with a list. Two months later Gerry is dead. Fifteen plus years from they met, thirty years old Gerry was diagnosed with a brain tumor.

A few months after Gerry's death, Holly remains grieving and unable to leave her home. Her mom calls to tell her that she has a package addressed to Holly with the word List above her name. A stunned Holly realizes somehow Gerry marshaled his energy to give her ten months of lists to help regain her equilibrium because he loved her so much he wanted her to live. Now Holly begins to follow Gerry's list with one envelop opened per month as he reaches from beyond the grave to help his beloved return to the living.

Title aside even if it is the salutation of each of Gerry's notes, PS, I LOVE YOU is a powerful character study that focuses on grieving and healing. Holly is a fantastic protagonist who begins to mend through the solace provided by Gerry. Her weird family and her best friends provide sympathy, but cannot help her overcome her dread of life without Gerry. The hero is incredible as he knew when he will die and planned accordingly for what he could do to get his cherished Holly out of her depression and mourning and into the light of life. Cecelia Ahern provides a powerful drama that will leave no one dry-eyed.

Harriet Klausner


P.S. I Love This Book...   November 23, 2005
 15 out of 18 found this review helpful

Holly and Gerry were the perfect married couple from day one. Always happy, always smiling, and always there for one another. The kind of couple that others envy. But at the age of thirty, Gerry is diagnosed with a life-threatening illness, and soon passes away. Holly is heartbroken. However, months after Gerry's death, Holly receives a package of letters that Gerry left for her before his death, letters instructing her to perform various different tasks that will keep his memory alive. Now, with the help of her closest girlfriends, and a family who drives her crazy, Holly is embarking on a new life that's even greater than the one she was forced to leave in the dust.

There are those books that leave you feeling sad upon completion, and those that leave you with a happy feeling. Cecelia Ahern's P.S. I LOVE YOU is a book that leaves you feeling a mix of both. Her characters are very in-depth, and dimensional, and show various sides of their personalities throughout the novel. This is a story that will make you laugh, and cry along with the characters, and hope for the best outcome possible for them. Like reading about your best friend, P.S. I LOVE YOU features sub-stories that will appeal to both sexes, both young and old. A first-rate first novel that will keep you guessing from first page to last. NOTE: Keep the tissues close by.

Erika Sorocco
Book Review Columnist for The Community Bugle Newspaper