Rafferty Lincoln Loves... Paperback – 13 Feb. 2018

“None of you realise the consequences of your gossiping. Not one of you.”Rafferty Lincoln is in his last year of school. He’s going through all the social anxiety any lad his age runs through and on top of that he has bad relations with his step-father. The lust of his life is the unobtainable Liberty Ashburn. But then he finds Minty and the horse-mad Liberty is hooked. Together with Wilbur, Liberty’s brother and the odd kid Dexter, who is the school victim, Rafferty sets about keeping the horse a secret. A secret that takes over their lives...There are times I could wish for a louder voice to tell the world about a book. This is one such time for this is a powerful book. It touches on the darkest side of childhood and teenage - the wanton, thoughtless, cruelty to peers; the vulnerability and loneliness; the misery of being victims of family disagreements or worse. But it is not a dark book. It is buoyant and hopeful, with humour and friendship. Above all it is real. No adult can read this and not be taken back to their days at school and any teen reading it is going to recognise themselves in this story. And that is no accident, it has been masterfully crafted by a brilliant author to be that way.“Bloody Dexter,” I mumbled loudly, turning to flash a sweet smile back at him. “You wait, I’ll be a horse whisperer before you know it.”The strongest point in this book has to be the characters. They are all so real, with the complexities of good intentions and thoughtlessness, kindness and selfishness, courage and cowardice - the paradox of being human and more so in the exaggerated landscape of teenage where individuals are still trying to navigate their sense of self between the shoals of those extremes. The pace is perfect, rising and falling with the mini-crises, like waves running up a beach, until the final tsunami sweeps the story away.The story itself is made believable, although objectively it is unlikely that a group of teens could find a place deserted enough to hide a horse and have no one notice for months on end. But the author makes it possible. The ending is bleak but not without hope. There is no final confirmation and the reader is left with the feeling that perhaps the ultimate verdict is not as absolute as even the characters seem to believe. I liked that.‘Looking back, I always wondered who saw whom first. Did the horse already know I was approaching from the rhythmic whirring of my wheels as I free-glided down the hill, or did I see the horse first, grazing on the grass verge down the dip in the narrow country lane?’If I were to find fault with this book at all it would be in the amount of foreshadowing. There is a lot too much of blatant foreshadowing rather than subtle and towards the end of the book rather than ramping up tension it becomes more of a spoiler. The events that unfold there would be more powerful, in my opinion, if they were not flagged up by the author and came to the reader as more of a surprise. In anticipating them, the impact is diminished. There are a few too many ‘if only I’d known’ type comments, so the events come to seem more inevitable than avoidable, when the truth is they were totally avoidable. But that is a very small fault in what is a truly masterful piece of writing.I loved this book. If I had to say who I recommend should read it, that is easy - everyone should.

A great read. From the first page I was hooked and couldn’t put it down. Emily Williams has created characters who are totally believable, and has woven a story that is unusual and intriguing. It’s not a book just for the young. Rafferty Lincoln Loves will strike a chord for us older ones who can easily recall the ups and downs of childhood relationships. Looking forward to the next book.

Just started, and flying through as very enjoyable reading.

Really enjoyed the book. It held me captivated throughout. Simply could not put it down! It left me hoping that there would be a sequel. Look forward to reading further stories by this author.

Last year, I read Emily Williams' debut novel, Letters to Eloise and it became one of my best reads of 2017. She contacted me a couple of weeks ago, asking whether I could read her new novel that's coming out on February 14th 2018 and I jumped at the chance. I was so excited that I emailed her back straight away saying 'yes', and as soon as Williams had sent me the book, I started to read...Rafferty Lincoln doesn't like horses. Not one bit. But when the popular high school girl of his dreams, Liberty Ashburn pulls him into a world of lead ropes and horse brushes, who is he to say no?Except this isn't any old horse. This is the missing racehorse, Profit's Red Ridge. The horse Rafferty and three of his friends are hiding from the world. And Liberty Ashburn isn’t just any ordinary high school girl. How far will Rafferty go to win her over?The first thing that I'm going to say about this book is that it's not as good as Letter to Eloise BUT it's still a very very good novel. Rafferty Lincoln Loves... is aimed more at a young adult audience whereas Letters to Eloise was aimed at a more adult audience. However, the one thing that is similar between both novels is that Williams really knows how to punch your gut with emotions. As LTE, this novel really played with emotions when it came to the characters, especially Rafferty and Liberty. At first, I loved them, then I hated them, then loved them again... It was a see-saw of emotions. All of the characters with RLL were deeply flawed which made me connect with them on a huge level. I hate it when YA characters don't have any flaws because c'mon, there is not one single individual on this entire planet that does not have any flaws. Rafferty and Liberty messed up. A LOT. And at times, Rafferty and Lincoln could just be plain horrible with how they treat each other, especially when they start rumours about each other and spread them around the school. I really really hated them for that, but at the end of the day, even though it's horrible to admit, that DOES happen in reality in high school. Which is a shame but Williams knows how to capture the reality of young adulthood in her novels.I also loved that the underlying storyline of this book was about horses. Now, I'm not a big fan of horses, but I can appreciate them and it was a different plot to read about than normal YA novels. Sure, RLL still had the same YA themes running throughout (coming of age, realising who you are as a person, working through personal troubles), but no matter how little or well the characters got on with each other, they always pulled together to look after Minty, the horse.One of my favourite characters in this book was Dexter. I loved how sweet he was with Minty, I loved how he would always try and sort out any crinkles in the friendship group and be (sometimes) be the mediator in arguments, and I just loved how brave he was. It was so sad to see him go through all of the trouble at high school and my heart just bled for him. He was such an innocent human being that I wanted to give a massive hug and just protect from the cruelty of the world. Alas, that's not possible. Also, it wasn't clearly stated in the novel, but I had the feeling that there were some feelings between Will and Dexter? I don't know if anyone else got this impression, but it was definitely there for me when I read it.Overall, this was a fantastic second novel from Williams. Even though I had a bit of a hit-and-miss relationship with Rafferty and Liberty, I still enjoyed reading their story. Williams just proves that she is an incredible writer that can seam together different characters lives and teenage problems brilliantly. Her writing keeps improving and I cannot wait to read more of her work!If you love YA, then you NEED to give Raffety Lincoln Loves... a read!