MEMORIZING YOU by DAN SKINNER

5 ++ Stars

Memorizing You is one of the most poetically beautiful, poignant and heart-breaking stories I’ve read. I truly don’t have enough accolades in my vocabulary to throw at this book nor its Author.

“You’ll always be my ‘Wow!”

It had my heart beating out of my chest with every emotion, my body and mind owns. The writing was flawless; every word bled off the pages into my heart and trickled out as tears of sadness or joy. This story became a part of me, I lived every bit of it alongside the characters. I shared their struggles, their love, their despair, and their hope. I’d become so immersed, I cried on and off all day after finishing and writing this review now brings it all back. A truly astounding book that should be experienced by everyone. This is one of those journeys that resonate so deeply. This story right here is why I love reading.

‘A thirsty man can only think of water. A hungry man can only think of food. The more I was deprived of the intimacy I wanted with Ryan, the stronger became my inclination for him.’

Memorizing You is the journey of David told in retrospect. We begin to follow him from a young age as he discovers – then comes to understand his sexuality.

‘The body knew of what the mind had no knowledge.’

We end when he’s a man in his fifties having learnt and experienced through his life alongside him;

his first kiss….

“That kiss was bigger than my dreams.”

his first love…

“You devastate me…You always have.”

his friendships…

“Things just change. If there’s one thing we have to get used to…it’s that we can’t get used to things.”

His family, his highs and his lows were intense, heart-breaking and beautiful. I was exhausted by the time I’d finished; my whole being had been through an emotional wringer. I was gutted when I reached that last page, I could have continued forever, I didn’t want to leave! I wasn’t ready to say goodbye….

“It’s because you can’t dream in the light, if you can’t live in it.”

Davis begins to come into his own when he meets the amazing Ryan with a heart so big and wonderful. Oh wow; these two had a love everyone dreams to experience and have. It was so all-encompassing, so beautiful, so real and so very honest. Two very different lads who came together to face the world with the purity of their love.

“… sometimes I feel like I’m caught in your gravity. And no matter where I am, anywhere in the world, if I wrote ‘I love you’ on a note, and made a paper airplane, and threw it into the breeze…. it would still find you. My words couldn’t escape you, any more than I can.”

The time in which this story begins made this journey that much harder to read due to the prejudice and ignorance. Set in the sixties and seventies this is a story of love deemed wrong by society and living through the adversity that brings. It’s a story of two lads wanting understanding and acceptance; wanting to be able to hold hands; but ultimately just wanting to be together without being in the spotlight for being ‘different’.

Memorizing you is also about loss. The loss of not being able to be who you truly are, the loss of what you want to be, the loss of the love that lives in your heart and the loss of hope caused by heart-breaking tragedy.

‘You are where I can read my happy ending…’

I cannot stress enough how much I wish for every single one of you to go and one-click this book. You need to, you’ll want to and you’ll never regret reading the story of David & Ryan. Please go right now and do just that, then get comfortable with a huge box of tissues next to you and get completely swept up and lost in an emotional and poetic romance reader’s dream.

“Sometimes what you want is right in front of you.”