The Last Love Note by Emma Grey
Australian journalist and best-selling YA author Emma Grey’s first adult novel The Last Love Note (Zibby Books) is an extraordinary bittersweet romance replete with genuine warmth, emotion and elements of wry humor. It was moving, uplifting and relevant leaving the reader with an appetite for more from this writer.
This stunning debut will half-break your heart then mend it with kintsugi, which is the centuries-old Japanese technique known as “golden joinery.” Instead of camouflaging broken porcelain or fine art pottery, the craftsmen create a special sap-based lacquer usually dusted with powdered gold, sometimes silver and less frequently platinum to create visible seams in conspicuous cracks that shimmer and catch the light. This highlighting of the flaws transforms otherwise ruined objects into beautiful pieces.
Inseparable Love
The writer demonstrates tremendous sensitivity to the topic of early-onset dementia which has led to the tragic death of the novel’s protagonist Kate’s beloved husband Cameron.
The pair met as university students, instantly compatible, nearly inseparable and married not long after graduation. They achieved successful careers and built a blissful life together enhanced by the birth of their precociously bright son Charlie, now five years old. One drawback: they had made a wrenching move away from their lifelong homes, families and friends in Melbourne three hundred miles to Queanbeyan, a small town outside of Canberra.
Cameron’s initial position as a lecturer in medieval literature at the Australian National University became a stepping stone to a fulfilling career with promotions following quickly for he proved to be a popular professor with students, faculty and administration alike. At the same time, Kate carved out a career as a university fundraiser. They shared seventeen tranquil, untroubled years together with a depth of love most people only aspire to experience.
Tragedy Strikes
Not long after active little Charlie learned to walk, the formerly articulate, decisive and courageous Cameron began to show disturbing signs of forgetfulness; a loss of words, confusion and fear. Neurological tests confirmed a diagnosis of aggressive Alzheimer’s disease.
With the support of the university, Cameron continued working as long as possible. One of his coping mechanisms, while he was still able, was to label nearly all objects at home and work with hundreds of Post-it notes in a variety of colors. Kate found them everywhere, reading “chair, table, desk, refrigerator, milk and so on” and wept when one on the baby’s crib read “Charlie”.
The rarer and most meaningful notes contained his momentarily lucid thoughts and messages to Kate with the final one tucked into a jacket pocket and discovered well after his death.
Love and Grief
Her upbeat, dearest friend Grace and understanding boss Hugh made themselves ever available to assist her with mundane matters and shoulders to cry on.
Cameron was dead within two years leaving Kate a 38-year-old grief-stricken widow who was the sole support of a three-year-old son. A myriad of responsibilities including her challenging job of leading a fundraising campaign for climate change research provide needed distraction and stability. Her precious little boy and handful of stalwart friends are essential in coping with the unimaginable sorrow and deep-set emotional wounds while she also confronts guilt engendered by the faint hope of beginning to experience life fully again but without betraying Cameron’s memory.
Emma Grey has written a highly original novel with The Last Love Note which is certainly not your typical rom-com. Beautifully written with grace and humor that uplifts the reader from heartache to a celebration of life. Genuine love never dies and presumptively the deceased would wish the surviving spouse to continue to honor them by embracing life.
Powerful and Uplifting
Emma Grey began creating this work of fiction shortly after her husband’s sudden death from a heart attack seven years ago: widowed at age 42 with a five-year-old son to raise.
From a posting on her website, Her Canberra, here is an excerpt from “This Was Not My Five Year Plan”:
“While I went numbly about the business of ‘starting again’ in my 40s, I made a decision to keep showing up in the world until I felt something for life again. With the imagined path in shreds at our feet, we had to machete our way through the darkness of grief until we found a new footing.”
In The Last Love Note, Emma Grey has deftly confronted challenging, emotionally charged subjects with grace and sensitivity, standing as testimony to the power of hope and love. It is ultimately uplifting, heartwarming and would be a fine selection for book clubs.
Readers will eagerly await her next book as Emma Grey’s writing compares well with best-selling authors Emily Henry, Elin Hilderbrand, Terri-Lynne DeFino and New Zealand author and screenwriter Sarah-Kate Lynch. Highly recommended.
About Emma Grey:
Emma Grey is an acclaimed Australian journalist and young adult fiction writer. Her writing has appeared in The Age, Canberra Times and Herald Sun. The Last Love Note is her debut adult novel. She lives in Canberra, Australia, with her family.
