“True love doesn’t always last,” I say. “It doesn’t always have to be for a lifetime”

Taylor Jenkins Reid really only does one thing, but she does it well. She sets up her main character with a wonderful love, does something to totally wreck it, and then helps her back along the path to happiness. Usually there’s a gay best friend (seriously, I think every novel I’ve read by her features a gay best friend) and a loving family member or two. Maybe some professional conflict. Might be formulaic, but One True Loves is the 4th book I’ve read by this author, and she hasn’t disappointed me yet.

“Don’t think that true love means your only love. I think true love means loving truly. Loving purely. Loving wholly. Maybe, if you’re the kind of person who’s willing to give all of yourself, the kind of person who is willing to love with all of your heart even though you’ve experienced just how much it can hurt . . . maybe you get lots of true loves, then. Maybe that’s the gift you get for being brave.”

In One True Loves, our main character Emma Blair loses her husband in a tragic accident on their one year wedding anniversary. She spends a couple years getting herself back together, rediscovers a childhood friend and ends up engaged to him. Then a couple months before her second wedding, she gets a call — turns out husband number one didn’t die after all. That all occurs in the first couple of chapters — we spend the rest of the book filling in the gaps between Emma meeting husband number one in high school, and getting engaged to number two. Once we’re brought up to speed, we watch as Emma tries to figure out just what the hell to do next.

It’s not the kind of book that you’ll remember years in the future, but that doesn’t detract from enjoying it in the moment. I liked Emma, and found myself hoping she’d take one path versus the other rather fervently. The side plot involving her family’s store held my attention pretty well, too.