Pack Up the Moon

If this had been a physical book read I’m convinced I would’ve gone through multiple highlighters and god knows how many tabs.. the details in this book just hit spot on for me and I went a little crazy at times, but it couldn’t be helped and I’m good with that. . This book snags on freshly healed scar tissue in the most exquisite way. There are so many tiny details in this book that only someone who physically cared for a loved one would understand.. Like little hidden gems just waiting to be discovered, they hold so much weight to those who’ve been there. The hospital stays, the oxygen, the medications and the complete loss of independence. . This book was cathartic and I bled right along with the characters. Lauren was a great wife and a planner, she spent her last few months planning her husband’s grief and recovery. I can only hope that if I’m placed in her shoes one day that I could be as amazing as her. Joshua.. that sweet sweet man. By the end of the book I felt like he was my friend and I was rooting for him from the sidelines of the marathon that is grief.. My heart absolutely b r o k e for him and reading his joy and excitement over her letters most definitely did not help.. how much more Shakespearean can this book get?! Reading Josh heal was just next level amazing, having to go through all the ‘firsts’ is such a daunting task and Josh was broken perfection throughout this book. . Pack up the Moon was just so tastefully done and all the hard things were so beautifully written.

This is the best book I have read so far this year! I was seriously cry at the end. This book has everything in it that one could want in a love story. And even the ending is not what you think it will be. A tragically beautiful story written by one of my very favorite authors. Kristan Higgins knows how to grab you in the first chapter and keep you glued to the very last page of her novels. She never bores you with the same old story but different names scenario. Nope. With each new book we get a beautiful story filled with love, life and even humor when you sometimes least expect it. (You know one of those moments when you laugh cry)! Yep those are in there to. This book is a beautiful story about Lauren and Joshua. We learn to love them both right at the beginning. We also learn of the tragedy that has struck this young married couple. Lauren has a terminal illness called IPF. Throughout this book you can't help but have hope, and wish for better things for these two and their dear family and friends. We have hope and I think Kristan helps us to have courage for them all. What she is able to do is weave the most beautiful love story out of this tragedy. I can't say enough about the author and her book. This book was written during the pandemic if I'm not mistaken, and it certainly made her creative juices flow. Kristan thank you for writing such a beautiful love story for us to read and enjoy over and over again! As for me I am a true fan and follower of this beautiful lady. I have had the pleasure of meeting her twice in person and getting my books signed by her. I am happy to say I purchased not only a physical copy of this book, but the audible version as well. I listened to the audible version and totally enjoyed Xe Sands and Dion Graham narrating. They were awesome and entertaining. What can I say, grab a copy of this book and curl up with it for a weekend! You won't be disappointed. The Best love story Ever!!

Wow! I put off reading this book for a long time. I just knew it was going to be so sad, and it was. However, it is so sweet along the way. Lauren and Josh were so wonderful together. Unfortunately, life can be so unfair. Lauren teaches Josh so much about life and what is truly important. With her help, Josh is able to grow and make new friends and realize that life goes on. Love changes but is always there. Love also has the ability to expand our hearts to let new people in.

Pack up the Moon by Kristan Higgins is probably the most beautiful love story I’ve ever read. The story is beautifully written and is also heart-wrenching, heartwarming, and even hilarious in places. Reading this book, I’ve used up almost all my emotions, and after the end, I’m exhausted, content, and uplifted.

Josh and Lauren were happily married for only a year when her diagnosis of a terminal illness drastically changes their life, but not their love for each other. After Lauren passes away, her best friend Sarah gives Josh a letter from Lauren every month for a year to help him move forward in his life. These letters give Josh a task, outside of his comfort zone, to help him move on.

This book is all about the love shared by Josh and Lauren, although we know from the start that Lauren has passed, the window into their love story is so overwhelming, intense, and beautiful, this story will just rip out your heart, and twist it until you have nothing left. This intense story is littered with Ms. Higgins’s special brand of humor, lightening up the intensity and giving the book a balance that few writers can achieve.

I read through this book, with a box of tissues nearby, without stopping as the story gripped me and kept me involved until the very end. This is a story about grief, and moving on, and told in such a way that you feel for each character and go through the pain, and healing with them. It was a window into how this lovely couple dealt with the news of a terminal illness, and how they learned to give each other the strength to deal with their new life, and the life after the death of one half of this loving couple.

I highly recommend this book to anyone who loves a great love story.

Higgins writes beautifully, and this book is testament to her gifts. The story is drenched in emotion. Josh and Lauren are both young, attractive, successful and wildly in love. Happily married for three years, they excitedly map out their future and dream of the family they’ll have one day. But as often happens, fate intervenes, and Lauren is diagnosed with a terminal lung disease at only 28 years-old. The couple reels with the sudden shock, staggering under the weight of their impending loss, watching their golden life suddenly implode. Yet, despite the dire circumstances, they still manage to find the magic in ordinary days, keenly aware that they are fortunate to have found each other, in spite of everything. In the hands of a less-skilled writer, the story could have been maudlin, shallow and trite, but Higgins transcends those traps, creating instead, a much deeper narrative that dares to mine the stark reality of loss. Higgins moves carefully through the raw, wrenching terrain with a deft touch and rarely makes a misstep. If there are some moments of overwrought and grand, profuse declarations of love that seem a bit cinematic, then chalk it up to the earnest certainty of youth. When the story works, it is largely because of Josh and his fierce devotion to Lauren. As a character, he is just so endearing. He has vulnerability and intelligence, which are a refreshing antidote to the usual, tired tropes for male protagonists created by other authors. I enjoyed seeing Josh grow and thrive in his first year as a widower. In order to help him cope, Lauren has left him a series of letters and tasks, one for each month, designed to gradually nudge him toward happiness again. The results are heart-tugging and often comical. Higgins has penned a big, encompassing tale that takes its time with grief. There is ample joy, heartbreak and renewal found within its pages. A sad, but luminous journey worth taking.

This one is a tearjerker. Wife, knowing that she’s dying, writes letters for her husband to open during the year after her death. Each of the monthly letters contains a task, an assignment, that the husband needs to complete. Some of the assignments are surprising and some have unexpected results, but she knows and loves her husband so well that the “homework” turns out to be just what he needs to do at that stage of his grief.

The structure of the book is a bit distracting: chapters presenting the monthly letters received (present day pov) alternate with chapters showing the history of their relationship. However, the relationship history chapters are in reverse chronological order, so the reader moves backwards to the time before her illness and then eventually to the story of how they met. I found this a little difficult to follow and didn’t like being jerked from present day back to some period in the past and then back to the present again, and so it took a moment at the beginning of each chapter to determine where and when it was taking place. I think the story would have been just as moving if it had been presented in a straight forward timeline.

However, it was overall well written and an absorbing read. Be sure to have tissues at hand, because even though you know what is going to happen it still wrecks you to experience it through words.