Aisha Muharrar

Most Anticipated Book of the Summer: New York Times Book Review, W Magazine, Real Simple, Oprah Daily, Hollywood Reporter, the Boston Globe, the Minneapolis Star Tribune, and The Millions “[Loved One] is special . . . full of wildly astute, delectably thorny questions about love and loss and possession.” —Maggie Shipstead, New York Times bestselling author of Great Circle “Shimmers with wit even as it explores deep loss.” —Rachel Khong, New York Times bestselling author of Real Americans From an Emmy Award–winning writer comes a funny, wise, heartbreaking story about a woman journeying into the unknown in the wake of sudden loss When her first-love-turned-close-friend, Gabe, dies unexpectedly at twenty-nine, thirty-year-old Julia is launched into an intercontinental quest to recover his lost possessions. Her journey takes her from Los Angeles to London and into the murky realm of the past. It also sets Julia on a collision course with the last woman he loved, a guarded, self-possessed florist and restaurateur named Elizabeth, who insists on withholding Gabe’s beloved guitar—one of the departed indie rock musician’s dearest belongings—for reasons Julia can’t understand. Both women, it turns out, have something to hide, and soon ﬁnd themselves engaged in a complex dance of withholding and revelation. An emotional mystery spanning years, continents, and relationship statuses, Loved One introduces Aisha Muharrar as a novelist intimately attuned to the intricacies of love, memory, and ambiguous loss. What happens when we admit that the deepest feelings never die? How do we reconcile various—and sometimes contradictory—truths about those closest to us? An engrossing and profoundly moving coming-of-age story with a powerful love at its heart, Loved One is poised to become an instant classic.

A Novel

Loved One

sofia mae

“You may not feel it yet, but at some point, it will hit you. And then you’ll be back to normal, talking to someone, just like we are now, and it will hit you all over again. Grief comes in waves.”

“And when you have that first love,” Roberta continued, “it is exquisite. Just because others have been in love before, it doesn’t make it any less intense or important. If it did, we’d never want to hear another pop song again.”

There was no harm to déjà vu, destiny, the Universe working for you when things were going well. 

I wasn’t worried about being single forever. I was worried about feeling this lonely forever.

“It’s not always bad to close yourself off to others. As long as you don’t do it with yourself."

I know that grief takes practice. And I’m patient with myself. Even though death happens all the time, no one could ever be a natural at this.

Loved One quotes

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