This Book Made Me Think of You: Literary Luck with a Tear-Jerking Tug

Melissa Gouty
1 day ago
5 min read

Libby Page's 2026 Novel

A book wrapped in brown paper and tied with ribbon like in This Book Made Me Think of You, by Libby Page

Literary Luck

Every so often, I'm struck with what I call "Literary Luck," the coincidental happenstance when the perfect book for your current emotional state drops into your lap. It happens when you least expect it, leaving you feeling woozy, weak, and warm from the experience, struck dumb by the beauty of the story. "Literary Luck" happened to me this last weekend when I decided to listen to Libby Page's 2026 novel, "This Book Made Me Think of You."

Books About Books

I'm a sucker for any book about books. Since I've heard the same thing from other bibliophiles, I know I'm not alone. Any title that teases a bookstore, a bookstore mystery, a hidden bookstore, a book hero, insights into book collectors, publishers, or authors, is a book I'll probably buy. Bookish people are funny that way.

So it's no surprise that I was drawn to a book with the simple, obvious title of "This Book Made Me Think of You" and cute, pastel cover art of a stack of books, each spine boasting a word of the title. The back of the book flaunted a quote that I believe in wholeheartedly and made me want to read it more:

"The right book in the hands of the right person at exactly the right moment can change their life forever."

The last three books I've read have been serious, heavy novels with hot-button issues laced with searing pain. "No worries," I thought. "I'll choose a lightweight romance. I won't have to think too hard, and it will be a fast read."

This Book Made Me Think of You was so much more than I expected, packing an emotional wallop I had not expected. The novel touched tender places in me and made me cry real tears multiple times...good, cleansing, cathartic tears, leaving me feeling whole and hopeful by the end.

Let me explain.

The main character of the story is Tilly Nightengale, a young woman who recently lost her husband to a terrible disease. Six months after her beloved Joe's death, she gets a call from Alphy, the owner of her local bookstore, telling Tilly that there is a package for her at the bookstore. She thinks there's some mistake until Alphy tells her that her husband Joe planned this gift for her last year.

Tilly finds out that Joe has gifted her with one book a month for the next year, deliverable one month at a time. Each book has a personal letter from Joe to Tilly, funny, sweet missives that remind her of the things they did together and the things she used to love to do.

Book lovers understand the power of books to motivate, inspire, transport, and teach. We believe they can even heal you, and over the next twelve months, we see that each book Joe has thoughtfully gifted Tilly is intended to help her work through grief, take an interest in the world around her again, and move ahead to a new life without him.

Lovely, poignant, and "spot-on" representations of grief

My husband, Bill, like Tilly's, died of a terrible, wasting disease. I had suffered the immense loss of my beloved husband just nine months ago making my situation very similar to Tilly's. As I was reading, I kept wondering if the author, Libby Page, had herself been widowed. Turns out that she has not, but in an interview with Writer's Digest, she did say she wrote this book to showcase the healing power of books when she was going through intense grief herself.

Libby Page also notes that This Book Made Me Think of You is a book for bibliophiles. In the novel, Page notes that she references over 60 real books. (I have to admit that I wondered if "Libby Page" was a pen name - because what author ends up with an authentically great marketing name like Page?) Talk about "Literary Luck!" Libby Page is her real name!

Grief and the Widow in This Book Made Me Think of You

When my husband was still healthy, I listened to some of my older, widowed friends talking about how they NEVER cooked anymore. They only went out to eat, had popcorn for dinner, or existed on cold cuts and cottage cheese. In my naivete, I thought, "Oh, no matter what, even if Bill is gone, I'll keep cooking. I like to eat too much not to!"

Never make judgments about situations you haven't experienced. I knew nothing about what widowhood would feel like. After my husband died, I couldn't bring myself to even think about cooking. Going to the grocery store was a monumental task. Meal prep was no longer fun without him. Planning and cooking meals without my husband's enthusiasm for eating them was pointless. Eating alone had less appeal than being run over by a truck.

When one of Joe's gifts to Tilly was a cookbook to lure her back into the kitchen, I cried.

In month seven, when Tilly receives Joe's monthly gift, "The Swedish Art of Death Cleaning," I wept, knowing what Tilly was feeling as she starts throwing away scrap paper and old receipts from Joe's desk. I was (almost) motivated to get started on cleaning out Bill's nightstand and bathroom drawers, filled with absolutely nothing of any value but still the last vestiges of his presence in the house. An old razor, a wrapper from a bar of soap, a travel toothbrush, and scattered Q-tips and cottonballs, in reality, don't even have much emotional meaning, but I hadn't had the strength to look into those drawers until I read This Book Made Me Think of You.

In spite of sadness...

Even though the book is about grieving, it is about so much more. It's about finding out who you are without the person who made you feel complete before. It's about the changing dimensions of friends and family in the face of loss. Finding the courage to do new things, go on new adventures, explore your options, and learn to smile again are all feats that are accomplished in time...and with the help of a good book.

As Literary Luck would have it, I had a lot in common with the main character. Like Tilly Nightengale, I have been a bookworm since I was a child. I, too, once trained for and completed a half-marathon just to prove I could do it. Tilly works in the publishing industry, but decides to freelance as I did, because it was more important to fill my creative soul than it was to be chained to a bigger company relegated to rules and mundane tasks.

This Book Made Me Think of You is a lovely novel. While my life situation made reading it a bit painful, it was also healing, helpful, and entertaining. Don't miss it. (I bought a hardback copy because this is a book that definitely needs to reside on my shelves, dropped in my lap by Literary Luck as it was.)

The author, Libby Page, achieved what she set out to do. In a Writer's Digest article, she said this:

I can’t promise that This Book Made Me Think of You won’t make you cry, but while it might break your heart a little, I also hope it will put it back together again. - Writer's Digest

Congrats, Libby Page. You did it! You wrote a book that made me cry because it felt real, but it also helped me heal, and for that, I am grateful.

Book Cover for This Book Made Me Think of You by Libby Page

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