I'll Be Your Blue Sky by Marisa de los Santos

Published: HarperCollins
Date: 6th March 2018
Format: e-ARC
Pages: 320
Genre: Contemporary Fiction
Source:Publisher via Edelweiss
Rating:
                

On the weekend of her wedding, Clare Hobbes meets an elderly woman named Edith Herron. During the course of a single conversation, Edith gives Clare the courage to do what she should have done months earlier: break off her engagement to her charming, yet overly possessive, fiancé.
,br/>Three weeks later, Clare learns that Edith has died—and has given her another gift. Nestled in crepe myrtle and hydrangea and perched at the marshy edge of a bay in a small seaside town in Delaware, Blue Sky House now belongs to Clare. Though the former guest house has been empty for years, Clare feels a deep connection to Edith inside its walls, which are decorated with old photographs taken by Edith and her beloved husband, Joseph.

Ah... what a perfectly satisfying emotional read. I'll be Your Blue Sky is the third book in Marisa de los Santos' Love Walked In books.  I've become invested in the characters in these books and especially loved Clare and Dev.  Yet this book starts off from the viewpoint of Edith, and that was good, because very quickly I was invested in her story too. And what an amazing story it is.

Edith and Clare meet on the eve of Clare's wedding to Zach, and Edith listens and shares wisdom with Clare. Meanwhile I am thinking - how on earth did Clare link up with Zach? And what happened to Dev? Come on, those two are made for each other. And then Clare tells the story of how that happened, and I think - how could she!

Well Clare comes to the same conclusion - and later on learning that Edith, on her death,  has left her a house, she goes there and follows some clues found there to reveal more to her about Edith and her life.  What follows is a whole journey that reveals Edith's courageous and loving life, and the risks she took.  Clare in following up on the clues and meeting up with the people who can give her answers finds her own safe place, her own blue sky, her own self.

This is a love story, a real love story, not a romance. It tells of love and heartbreak, of rightness and wrongness. It is beautifully written, the journey and clues crafted down to the smallest details. It takes us back to the 1950's when things were a little harsher socially, society still was not ready to help battered women, but there were people who were willing to help at a cost to themselves.

This was a very satisfying read, yes you could easily read it as a stand alone, however I'd highly recommend you read in order - Love Walked In, Belong to Me and then I'll Be Your Blue Sky.