With Love, Echo Park is from one of my auto-buy authors Laura Taylor Namey. It’s a story about family, secrets, and love. There’s tenderness from start to finish. If you love stories that are about family which surprises you – in good and bad ways – and changes in perspective. Keep reading this book review of With Love, Echo Park for my full thoughts.
Summary
Seventeen-year-old Clary is set to inherit her family’s florist shop, La Rosa Blanca—one of the last remnants of the Cuban business district that once thrived in Los Angeles’s Echo Park neighborhood. Clary knows Echo Park is where she’ll leave a legacy, and nothing is more important to her than keeping the area’s unique history alive.
Besides Clary’s florist shop, there’s only one other business left founded by Cuban immigrants fleeing Castro’s regime in the sixties and seventies. And Emilio, who’s supposed to take over Avalos Bicycle Works one day, is more flight risk than dependable successor. While others might find Emilio appealing, Clary can see him itching to leave now that he’s graduated, and she’ll never be charmed by a guy who doesn’t care if one more Echo Park business fades away.
But then Clary is caught off guard when an unexpected visitor delivers a shocking message from someone she thought she’d left behind. Meanwhile, Emilio realizes leaving home won’t be so easy—and Clary, who has always been next door, is who he confides in. As the summer days unfold, they find there’s something stronger than local history tying them together.
Review
(Disclaimer: I received this book from the publisher. This has not impacted my review which is unbiased and honest.)
With Love, Echo Park is a story that is multi-faceted. On one hand, there’s very much the swoony romantic story line about love in place we wouldn’t expect. And on the other hand, there’s a story about family secrets that hurt and heal. I came for the romance and ended up staying for the story about family. About family which should come with no strings attached, be unconditional love, and ends up being twisted with feelings of guilt. People who try to protect us and only end up hurting us. With Love, Echo Park is a story about community. Family, friends, and the history of our homes.
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Facing the pressures of the nieghborhood changing, how can we hold on to what makes our home. The fading paint, the businesses and families thriving, and the community that becomes our own. Clary and Emilio have to consider the future of their families and neighborhood weighed against their own. With all these paths for the future, what can we do? At the same time, it’s about how do we make space in our life for someone? New family, family which has always been there, and those who show up for us.
I adored the interchanges between Clary and Emilio. Their banter, learning to ride a bike, and divulging secrets. About the people in our lives who we can’t risk. Find With Love, Echo Park on Goodreads, Storygraph, Amazon, Bookshop.org, Blackwells, & Libro. fm.