Our Souls at Night: A Novel by Kent Haruf - Heartwarming Love Story for Mature Readers | Perfect for Book Clubs, Gifts & Cozy Evenings

I’ll come right out and say it. This book is one of the best books I’ve read in the last few years. I was hooked from page one and finished it in two sittings. I was torn between not wanting the story to end and being unable to put it down, wanting to know how the story ends.It’s a short and very powerful read that has superb pacing and character development. It is the tender and poignant story of Addie Moore and Louis Waters, two widowed people in their senior years who are neighbors and both extremely lonely. The story opens simply and plainly, with Addie walking over to Louis’s house and making what, to him (and most people) an unusual proposition that would cure the loneliness they both feel, especially in the evenings. She proposes that he comes over to her house some nights, to spend the night in her bed with her and just talk, to help them both get through the lonely nights. She was not suggesting anything sexual and she tells him so; rather just lying in bed with another person to talk about themselves, their thoughts, their hopes and their dreams.It works out quite well for a while, until word gets around that Louis is going over to Addie’s house at night and leaving in the mornings. Addie and Louis take the right approach by ignoring and not caring about the gossip and the judgmental stares from neighbors. They just go on doing something that brings them both much pleasure and contentment, until it becomes personal and Addie’s son (who had previously brought Addie’s young grandson over to Addie’s house to stay for the summer) becomes insistent that they stop seeing each other. What transpires after that is what this story is really about: people judging other people’s lives and the devastating effects that can have. Addie and Louis had developed a very close relationship with each other as well as with Addie’s grandson and this delicate and caring relationship among the three of them is threatened by the ensuing events.At first, I must admit that I was put off by reading the dialogue without quotation marks. I found it awkward initially, but it took me very little time to adjust to it because it just seemed to fit the in the telling of the story somehow and is appropriate for the way the author chose to deliver the story to his readers. This technique served to show the characters’ thoughts in a straightforward manner and the dialogue itself has a simple clarity that is refreshing to read and rarely seen in contemporary writing.This heartwarming story brought me close to tears several times. It’s an honest and unassuming statement about how people judge things they do not understand, the effects that can cause, and how two people can find exactly what they need in each other.