Genre Fiction
![Emily Giffin - [object Object] author](https://res.cloudinary.com/readsomnia/image/upload/authors/a_a_emily_giffin.jpg)
Meant to Be: A Novel
A restless golden boy and a girl with a troubled past navigate a love story that may be doomed before it even begins, in this "glorious, satisfying" (Adriana Trigiani) new novel from the #1 New York Times bestselling author of All We Ever Wanted and The Lies That Bind.
"I'm a sucker for an iconic, against-all-odds love story, and Meant to Be truly delivers."-Tia Williams, author of Seven Days in June
The Kingsley family is American royalty, beloved for their military heroics, political service, and unmatched elegance. In 1967, after Joseph S. Kingsley, Jr. is killed in a tragic accident, his charismatic son inherits the weight of that legacy. But Joe III is a free spirit-and a little bit reckless. Despite his best intentions, he has trouble meeting the expectations of a nation, as well as those of his exacting mother, Dottie.
Meanwhile, no one ever expected anything of Cate Cooper. She, too, grew up fatherless-and after her mother marries an abusive man, she is forced to fend for herself. After being discovered by a model scout at age sixteen, Cate decides that her looks may be her only ticket out of the cycle of disappointment that her mother has always inhabited. Before too long, Cate's face is in magazines and on billboards. Yet she feels like a fraud, faking it in a world to which she's never truly belonged.
When Joe and Cate unexpectedly cross paths one afternoon, their connection is instant and intense. But can their relationship survive the glare of the spotlight and the so-called Kingsley curse? In a beautifully written novel that captures a gilded moment in American history, Emily Giffin tells the story of two people searching for belonging and identity, as well as the answer to the question: Are certain love stories meant to be?
"I'm a sucker for an iconic, against-all-odds love story, and Meant to Be truly delivers."-Tia Williams, author of Seven Days in June
The Kingsley family is American royalty, beloved for their military heroics, political service, and unmatched elegance. In 1967, after Joseph S. Kingsley, Jr. is killed in a tragic accident, his charismatic son inherits the weight of that legacy. But Joe III is a free spirit-and a little bit reckless. Despite his best intentions, he has trouble meeting the expectations of a nation, as well as those of his exacting mother, Dottie.
Meanwhile, no one ever expected anything of Cate Cooper. She, too, grew up fatherless-and after her mother marries an abusive man, she is forced to fend for herself. After being discovered by a model scout at age sixteen, Cate decides that her looks may be her only ticket out of the cycle of disappointment that her mother has always inhabited. Before too long, Cate's face is in magazines and on billboards. Yet she feels like a fraud, faking it in a world to which she's never truly belonged.
When Joe and Cate unexpectedly cross paths one afternoon, their connection is instant and intense. But can their relationship survive the glare of the spotlight and the so-called Kingsley curse? In a beautifully written novel that captures a gilded moment in American history, Emily Giffin tells the story of two people searching for belonging and identity, as well as the answer to the question: Are certain love stories meant to be?
Editorial Reviews
Praise for Meant to Be and Emily Giffin
"Meant To Be is the most golden, heart-crunching, epic love story, which swept me away into another time and another world."-Sophie Kinsella
"A dependably down-to-earth, girlfriendly storyteller."-The New York Times
"[A] modern-day Jane Austen."-Vanity Fair
"Giffin's writing is true, smart, and heartfelt."-Entertainment Weekly
"Giffin [has a] trademark ability to capture the complexities of human emotions while telling a rip-roaring tale."-The Washington Post
"Giffin is a worldwide bestselling author because she gets under your skin-by creating relatable characters wrestling within believable situations."-The Atlanta Journal-Constitution
"If you've never read Emily Giffin, Meant to Be is the perfect place to start. This glorious, satisfying novel from the master storyteller of contemporary fiction is impossible to put down. It's Giffin's best novel yet-and they are all exceptional."-Adriana Trigiani, New York Times bestselling author of The Good Left Undone
"Meant to Be elegantly captures love in all its passionate, messy, wonderful glory. Emily Giffin's writing is addictive-from the first page to the final line. This warm hug of a book is the perfect literary escape."-Jill Santopolo, New York Times bestselling author of Everything After
"I'm a sucker for an iconic, against-all-odds love story, and Meant to Be truly delivers. This fun, addictive read is a must for anyone enchanted by family dynasties, the private lives of the rich and f...
"Meant To Be is the most golden, heart-crunching, epic love story, which swept me away into another time and another world."-Sophie Kinsella
"A dependably down-to-earth, girlfriendly storyteller."-The New York Times
"[A] modern-day Jane Austen."-Vanity Fair
"Giffin's writing is true, smart, and heartfelt."-Entertainment Weekly
"Giffin [has a] trademark ability to capture the complexities of human emotions while telling a rip-roaring tale."-The Washington Post
"Giffin is a worldwide bestselling author because she gets under your skin-by creating relatable characters wrestling within believable situations."-The Atlanta Journal-Constitution
"If you've never read Emily Giffin, Meant to Be is the perfect place to start. This glorious, satisfying novel from the master storyteller of contemporary fiction is impossible to put down. It's Giffin's best novel yet-and they are all exceptional."-Adriana Trigiani, New York Times bestselling author of The Good Left Undone
"Meant to Be elegantly captures love in all its passionate, messy, wonderful glory. Emily Giffin's writing is addictive-from the first page to the final line. This warm hug of a book is the perfect literary escape."-Jill Santopolo, New York Times bestselling author of Everything After
"I'm a sucker for an iconic, against-all-odds love story, and Meant to Be truly delivers. This fun, addictive read is a must for anyone enchanted by family dynasties, the private lives of the rich and f...
Short Excerpt Teaser
CHAPTER 1
Joe
I don't remember my father. At least that's what I tell people when they ask if I do. I was barely three years old when he died. I once read that it's impossible to have memories much before the age language fully develops. Apparently, we need words to translate our experiences, and if memories aren't encoded linguistically, they become irretrievable. Lost in our minds. So I've accepted that my vague recollections of the day he was put to rest at Arlington National Cemetery are fabricated-an amalgam of photographs, news footage, and accounts from my mother that were somehow planted in my brain.
But there is one memory that can't be explained away so easily. In it, I am wearing red footie pajamas, padding down the wide-plank wood floors of our home in Southampton. It is nighttime, and I am following the white glow of Christmas lights, along with the hum of my parents' voices. I reach the end of the hallway and peer around the corner, hiding so I don't get in trouble. My mother spots me and orders me back to bed, but my father overrules her, laughing. I am overcome with joy as I run to him, climbing onto his lap and inhaling the cherry-vanilla scent of his pipe. He wraps his arms around me, and I put my head on his chest, listening to the sound of his heart beating in my ear. My eyelids are heavy, but I fight sleep, focusing on one gold ball on our tree, wanting to stay with him as long as I can.
I guess it's possible that this memory, too, is illusory, a scene I imagined or dreamed. But it almost doesn't matter. It feels so real. So I've decided that it is, clinging to it as the one thing of my father's that belongs only to me.
I know what people would say to this. They'd say, No, Joe, you have so much more than that. You have his wristwatch and his rocking chair. You have his eyes and his smile. You have his name.
It always comes back to that name-Joseph S. Kingsley-which we also share with his father, my grandfather. The S is for Schuyler, the name of the family who landed in New Amsterdam via the Dutch Republic in the seventeenth century. Somehow, we spun off from those folks-as did the Oyster Bay Roosevelts-privilege and wealth begetting more privilege and wealth as a handful of families intermarried, curried favor, and became increasingly prominent in business, the military, politics, and society. My great-grandfather Samuel S. Kingsley, a financier and philanthropist, had been close friends with Teddy Roosevelt, the two boys growing up a few blocks apart in Manhattan, then attending Harvard together. When Samuel died in a freak hunting accident, Teddy became a mentor to my grandfather, recruiting him for his Great White Fleet and eventually introducing him to my grandmother, Sylvia, a fiery young suffragist from yet another prominent New York family.
Joseph and Sylvia married in 1919, right before my grandfather shipped out for the First World War. While Joseph commanded a Sampson-class destroyer and earned the Navy Cross, my grandmother continued to battle for women's right to vote, helping to organize the "Winning Plan," a blitz campaign that lobbied southern states to ratify the Nineteenth Amendment. Her fight would last longer than the war, but on August 18, 1920, the suffragists finally got the thirty-sixth state they needed when a young man in the Tennessee statehouse changed his vote at the eleventh hour, crediting an impassioned note he'd received from his mother.
My grandmother would tell this story often, citing it as an auspicious sign for her own son-my father-born that very same summer day. Two more boys and three girls would follow, making six kids in total, and although each had unique gifts and abilities, my grandmother turned out to be right. My father was special, her eldest son emerging as the standout of the Kingsley clan.
My father excelled in everything as a boy, then graduated at the top of his class at Harvard before matriculating at Yale Law. When World War II broke out during his second year at Yale, he entered the NROTC, then joined my grandfather in the Pacific. Whole books have been written about their time in combat, but the most significant moment came in late 1944, when the two Joseph Kingsleys found themselves side by side in the Battle for Leyte Gulf, the rear admiral and lieutenant junior grade narrowl...
Joe
I don't remember my father. At least that's what I tell people when they ask if I do. I was barely three years old when he died. I once read that it's impossible to have memories much before the age language fully develops. Apparently, we need words to translate our experiences, and if memories aren't encoded linguistically, they become irretrievable. Lost in our minds. So I've accepted that my vague recollections of the day he was put to rest at Arlington National Cemetery are fabricated-an amalgam of photographs, news footage, and accounts from my mother that were somehow planted in my brain.
But there is one memory that can't be explained away so easily. In it, I am wearing red footie pajamas, padding down the wide-plank wood floors of our home in Southampton. It is nighttime, and I am following the white glow of Christmas lights, along with the hum of my parents' voices. I reach the end of the hallway and peer around the corner, hiding so I don't get in trouble. My mother spots me and orders me back to bed, but my father overrules her, laughing. I am overcome with joy as I run to him, climbing onto his lap and inhaling the cherry-vanilla scent of his pipe. He wraps his arms around me, and I put my head on his chest, listening to the sound of his heart beating in my ear. My eyelids are heavy, but I fight sleep, focusing on one gold ball on our tree, wanting to stay with him as long as I can.
I guess it's possible that this memory, too, is illusory, a scene I imagined or dreamed. But it almost doesn't matter. It feels so real. So I've decided that it is, clinging to it as the one thing of my father's that belongs only to me.
I know what people would say to this. They'd say, No, Joe, you have so much more than that. You have his wristwatch and his rocking chair. You have his eyes and his smile. You have his name.
It always comes back to that name-Joseph S. Kingsley-which we also share with his father, my grandfather. The S is for Schuyler, the name of the family who landed in New Amsterdam via the Dutch Republic in the seventeenth century. Somehow, we spun off from those folks-as did the Oyster Bay Roosevelts-privilege and wealth begetting more privilege and wealth as a handful of families intermarried, curried favor, and became increasingly prominent in business, the military, politics, and society. My great-grandfather Samuel S. Kingsley, a financier and philanthropist, had been close friends with Teddy Roosevelt, the two boys growing up a few blocks apart in Manhattan, then attending Harvard together. When Samuel died in a freak hunting accident, Teddy became a mentor to my grandfather, recruiting him for his Great White Fleet and eventually introducing him to my grandmother, Sylvia, a fiery young suffragist from yet another prominent New York family.
Joseph and Sylvia married in 1919, right before my grandfather shipped out for the First World War. While Joseph commanded a Sampson-class destroyer and earned the Navy Cross, my grandmother continued to battle for women's right to vote, helping to organize the "Winning Plan," a blitz campaign that lobbied southern states to ratify the Nineteenth Amendment. Her fight would last longer than the war, but on August 18, 1920, the suffragists finally got the thirty-sixth state they needed when a young man in the Tennessee statehouse changed his vote at the eleventh hour, crediting an impassioned note he'd received from his mother.
My grandmother would tell this story often, citing it as an auspicious sign for her own son-my father-born that very same summer day. Two more boys and three girls would follow, making six kids in total, and although each had unique gifts and abilities, my grandmother turned out to be right. My father was special, her eldest son emerging as the standout of the Kingsley clan.
My father excelled in everything as a boy, then graduated at the top of his class at Harvard before matriculating at Yale Law. When World War II broke out during his second year at Yale, he entered the NROTC, then joined my grandfather in the Pacific. Whole books have been written about their time in combat, but the most significant moment came in late 1944, when the two Joseph Kingsleys found themselves side by side in the Battle for Leyte Gulf, the rear admiral and lieutenant junior grade narrowl...
