I love the series but I feel like it’s turning into a romance novel rather than a thriller. I keep hoping for a book that’s more similar to You, but they just keep getting farther and farther away from it. I wish this book was the final one and Joe got a happy ending.

In You Love Me Joe moves to Washington and volunteers at a library where he strives to be a good person. He meets a woman, Mary Kay, whom he wants to build a life. They spent time together at the library sharing coffee and lunch. There’s a few minor problems, she married and has a teenage daughter. Also her friends and family occupy her time. However, Joe never lets a few obstacles stand in his way of what he wants. He prods himself into her life winning her over through book references.

I love Joe’s character and Penn Badgley will forever be ingrained in my mind as the perfect Joe Goldberg. When I read these books Penn is who I’m visualizing. It’s great having a face to identify when reading about Joe. I imagine after writing three books Caroline writes Joe with Penn in mind. At times I found Joe’s character rambling too much. He goes from one topic to the next with very little relevance.

I read You and remember struggling thru the writing. When Netflix came out with the You series I watched it and it all made sense. So I watched Hidden Bodies and again this series flourished in my mind. Well here I am again trying to read You Love Me and find myself struggling once again. It seems Caroline’s writing voice is difficult for me to translate on paper. Apparently I need to visualize this story. Seeing Joe in character is better received on screen then on paper.

I recommend reading the previous two books before reading You Love Me. Previous characters are mentioned several times in this book. Joe has a certain pattern to his love process that needs to be viewed from the beginning.

Caroline has a wonderful sense of humor with Joe’s character. Joe’s an intelligent guy who is well versed in all things book related. I unfortunately am not familiar with all the movie, books, and actors mentioned in this story. However that only limited my understanding of Joe’s inside banter with Mary Kay a little bit. While I don’t fit into their book world I certainly can appreciate the appeal to create such characters with similar interests.

Caroline Kepnes is an American writer, screenwriter, author and formerly, an entertainment reporter. She is best known for her novels You, Hidden Bodies, Providence and You Love Me.

Caroline Nolan uses a lot of words but to me it’s a jumbled mess of words. Ex. …and your Murakami is below and then it is on top and I am a boy and I am a man and you are a girl and you are a woman. I don’t understand Caroline’s writing voice, she isn’t speaking my language. I’m confused by the string of words she puts together. Not just in this sentence but in others as well. I’m not understanding the language in which Caroline chose to voice Joe’s character.
I still love Joe’s character and this diabolical storyline. I’m more excited at the prospect of watching the series on Netflix. My opinion on the book will change once I see it performed.

Thank you to the publisher and NetGalley for an eARC in exchange for an honest review.

You Love Me brings us to a small island off Seattle, WA; Joe's new oasis after all the craziness with the Quinns. He looks to stay under the radar and be a good guy, leaving his past and numerous bodies behind him. However when he meets Mary Kay at the library he is volunteering at will he fall back into his old ways? Or is the the perfect woman for Joe, someone who will help him turn it all around?

Caroline Kepnes is a bonafide magician...seriously. How she can make someone like Joe not only palitable but enchanting/desirable for not just one but three novels is beyond me. I hate myself for finding Joe so attractive and charming, but it also helps me understand how he reels in conquest after conquest. Joe has changed alot in this novel. I won't spoil it for you, dear reader, but be prepared for a wild ride. The beginning of this novel will make you feel like Kepnes has lost her magic and leave you wondering where she is going with the story. The middle finds us back on track and the ending will leave you with whiplash, begging for more. I need a book 4, crave it after those twists and turns, and can't wait to see who Joe meets next.

Five stars for our endearing stage five clinger. I recommend this for anyone 18+ as, with the previous two books, there is some explicit sexual content as well as violence. I wait on baited breath for Joe's next adventure, let me know how you feel about this third installment.

Joe is back and creepier than ever. New destination: Pacific Northwest. New occupation: librarian. New lady to mess with: Mary Kay DiMarco. Only setback? Mary has her own life. Joe is ready to fall in love. Will there actually be a happily ever for Joe? Or will has past come back to haunt him?
Joe has a dark mind and Caroline Kepnes has a great way of displaying it. The plot was fast but the ending was longer than necessary. Anyone familiar with the Netflix series will adore this fresh take on Joe.

Published: April 6, 2021
Random House
I received a copy of this book for free, and I leave my review voluntarily.

Carolyn Kepnes is the author of You, Hidden Bodies, Providence, and numerous short stories. Her work has been translated into a multitude of languages and inspired a television series adaptation of You, currently on Netflix. Kepnes graduated from Brown University and previously worked as a pop culture journalist for Entertainment Weekly and a TV writer for 7th Heaven and The Secret Life of the American Teenager. She grew up on Cape Cod, Massachusetts, and now lives in Los Angeles.

“Love, Joe.”

Joe is starting over, again, on Bainbridge Island. He is isolated from the life he lived, but things are looking up. Joe vows he will change. Make better choices. And when he sees the beautiful librarian, Joe thinks this could be his opportunity to not only start fresh but have a happily ever after if he makes it that far.

I enjoyed this installment of this series. I like the character of Joe, despite his deadly flaws. I loved the setting for this novel and the character development.

Joe is a new man- he’s starting over, with minimal strings attached, and he thinks he has found the one. Again. Again. Again. Again. Hopefully, history doesn’t repeat itself.

The pacing of this book was fast, and the build-up was well done. The twists were so well-plotted, and you won’t see them coming. This was a semi-different spin on this series, and I have to say, I enjoyed it.

Fast-paced, intense, and beautiful familiar- this book is everything you're looking for in an intensely scary book.

I LOVE this series, but You Love Me was definitely a slow read for me. However, I do enjoy Joe’s point of view as the narrator and overall still enjoyed this book — especially the last 100 pages! I didn’t enjoy it as much as the first two, but it was still a good read. Thanks to Net Galley for the e-book!

One of the worst books I've read in a long time. This third installment in the series was a complete waste of time. Joe will always remain the same, no growth in his character. The supporting characters were horrible. Love's unfortunate demise was one of the dumbest ways to kill off a character. It was as if the author couldn't think of anything better and just wanted to hurry her part and get rid of her. I highly do not recommend.

Although a good story, main character Joe was just to whinny this time around. The relationship this time was also sort of boring until the ending.

Amazing book! Like all of her books! I hope they continue this story with the Netflix show! I think he is one of the characters where you just love to hate!

Oh my gosh Joe is back again!! I love Joe, he’s my favorite fictional psychopath and I was so excited to crawl back into Joe’s head and see where life has taken him this time and boy was it yet again different from before.

You Love Me is the third book in Caroline Kepnes’s You series and it picks up Joe Goldberg’s story a little while after the ending of the second book. If you haven’t read any of the You series before I’d highly suggest starting the series from the beginning and getting to know this awesome character from there. Each of the book’s take place at a different stage in Joe’s life and it’s all best understood in order.

This time around Joe has give up big city life and has moved to a small island in the Pacific Northwest. Joe had plans for this to be the place where he would have taken his family but after a slight urging to sign away his parental rights Joe is now on his own and his eye on the local librarian as he volunteers at the library to pass his time.

I started off this series thinking I had found the creepiest, most disturbing character around. With the story being told from Joe’s thoughts as he stalked a young woman I couldn’t turn the pages fast enough being engaged and horrified all at the same time. When the second book came around I actually began to root for Joe *gasp*. Joe is witty, disturbed, mesmerizing and intoxicating and now he is almost learning some self control. I was completely hooked yet again and still rooted for him as he tried to be good, sort of, maybe and even having read three novels I still am addicted to his unique way of viewing the world.

I received an advance copy from the publisher via NetGalley.

I really enjoyed the way the book was written, it is really fun to get everything through Joe’s point of view and then be surprised along with him when things turn out to be different than he’d perceived.
This next part is more about my personal preference for where I was expecting things to go in the series: I haven’t read the first two books, only watched the series. Something I really liked about part 1 was Joe’s witty/sarcastic sense of humor. He was cynical and funny and seemed very smart which made him attractive despite his actions. In this book, Joe is trying to be different and I get it, but he just seems to be a step or two behind all the time and seems to be getting by on luck more than the witty charm he had before. The story was still very entertaining and worth the read... I was just left feeling like I would’ve liked it a lot more had I not had higher expectations based on parts 1 & 2.

I read this in one seating. Absolutely love Joe and his growth. This book was exceptional. Being back in his mind is always fun and twisted. I loved the twist at the end . I hope the author continues. I would read anything about him.


Received book from netgalley but read before getting accepted.

I loved You and I loved Hidden Bodies. I was so excited to get back to the story of Joe, and I do think she has elaborated and developed his character appropriately; however, I wish the pace was better. There were the OMG shock factor I-have-to-keep-reading chapters, but this one did not fully immerse my attention as the other ones have. I am very interested in seeing how the Netflix series plays out since it was being written before she finished the book and Hidden Bodies was very loosely adapted for You (season 2).

You, the first book in this series, is so creepy, with one of the most sinister protagonist's I've ever read, and felt like I was on the edge of my seat the whole time. Joe Goldberg is obsessive, pathological, and so manipulative and while you are disgusted by him, you also cannot help but kind of root for him?! His internal monologuing is so dark and twisty and Caroline Kepnes is pure genius in this one. The sequel, Hidden Bodies, Joe continued his obsessive behaviors and moved from NYC to LA to start over but really, it felt like he lost some of his touch and the shock value that we grew to love from the first book. ⁣
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I was excited for You Love Me, the third in the series, to see where Joe was at, especially with how the second book ended. But, it was a bit disappointing to me and this felt like a very different Joe. He is trying to change his ways but it makes for a much different story and character. The overall tone of the book really shifts and feels like Joe is a bit softer (if you can call his serial killer tendencies softer) and trying to be more likable. The story dragged for me for most of the book and felt about 100 pages too long. I usually always finish a series if I start one, and probably will end up reading the fourth one, but really feels like this series could have just ended at two for me. ⁣

This was a wild ride. The last quarter got a bit “too much” even for the world of Joe but overall I still loved it. Somehow I’m rooting for the bad guy in all of this


Though I do agree that this really wasn’t a Thriller the way You was, i feel like Hidden Bodies was also more thrilling than this. This was ..... somehow lower stakes. Like for the first time I felt like Kepnes WANTED us to like Joe. In the first two installments I hated him but was low key rooting for him anyway. This time I actually genuinely felt like he was in situations that he didn’t entirely create. (Hes still guilty of being an overall bad and shady person... but this time it’s not ALL his fault)

My biggest disappointment was the lack of consequence. Which is where it felt less thrilling. Every time something Big happened it really kind of just went away in favor of the domestic drama it created. Whereas before we spent a lot of time feeling like Joe watching over his shoulder trying to determine if he’d get caught.

Nonetheless this was a good story, I was engaged the entire time and wanting to know how it ended. Tho I wouldn’t have minded more Thriller to it and a bit less Pining

I know this is weird to say given the storyline of this character, however, I cannot get enough of Joe! I am so incredibly intrigued by this character and I love being in this world. I am on the edge of my seat wanting to know what he is going to do next or what will happen next. I love every minute of reading this and I can't wait for more from this series and I can't wait for more from this author!

Joe Goldberg is back and as eerily difficult to hate as ever in the third installment of Caroline Kepnes’ You series, and this time around he’s tackling the Pacific Northwest. Fans of the series will remember that the previous installment, Hidden Bodies, ended with Love Quinn—Joe’s second major love interest—pregnant while Joe was in jail, possibly facing charges for the lives of several people lost in the line of Joe’s search for love. You Love Me quickly (and finally) reveals the aftermath of these circumstances, but it’s a You novel, which means that all is never truly as it seems. You simply have to keep reading up until the very last page if you want to know the full story.

In You Love Me, Joe’s love interest is Mary Kay DiMarco, a librarian at the library where Joe is volunteering. Unlike Joe’s previous love interests, Mary Kay is much older than him and also the mother of a senior in high school. So begins Joe’s usual song-and-dance routine of manipulating everyone around him as he inserts himself into Mary Kay’s life and tries to make her “realize” that he’s the perfect guy for her. However, as readers quickly learn, Joe’s new life isn’t quite free of his many “hidden bodies.”

Despite having a more subdued slow-build beginning than its fast-paced, bam-bam-bam predecessors, once You Love Me starts to pick up it has that no-time-to-breathe feel that makes all the books in the series nearly impossible to put down. As per usual, Kepnes pulls out all the stops with bottomless cliffhangers and narrative-shaking revelations. And, as always, one of the most enjoyable features of Kepnes’ You series is the abundance of pop culture references, especially literary allusions—to read any book in the series is to put ten more on your to-read list.

The dramatic change of setting to the Pacific Northwest goes a long way towards making the book feel fresh while Joe’s trademark mix of first-person and second-person narration keeps it feeling familiar, reminding fans of the series why they’re coming back to the character and his story. Kepnes has an uncanny talent when it comes to immersing readers in vastly different settings each time around, and Washington state feels as vibrant and real as New York and Los Angeles did in You and Hidden Bodies. It’s fascinating to see Joe act as a chameleon, seamlessly integrating himself into whatever new part of the country he lands in while readers get to explore this new territory with him. This also serves to remind us of Kepnes’s central thesis: men like Joe can and do survive anywhere and everywhere.

Unfortunately, like many sequels, You Love Me falls flat, tripped up by its own ambition. You on its own is a fantastic stand-alone, so much so that when Hidden Bodies came around, I was intensely curious but also intensely skeptical about how Kepnes could possibly continue the saga of Joe Goldberg and pull it off as well as she did in You. Hidden Bodies, though, impossibly raised the stakes and one-upped You.

I had similar expectations for You Love Me, and unfortunately, it didn’t quite hit the mark. It’s clear that You Love Me is trying too hard to both adhere to whatever formula made the first two books so fantastic while also trying to veer off-course in an attempt to keep fans gasping every other page—it was the latter accomplishment that made Hidden Bodies a surprisingly outstanding follow-up.

Unlike Hidden Bodies, however, You Love Me veers off-course into the unhinged—the magic simply isn’t there anymore. About midway through the novel, the events become illogical and unsatisfying. The chapters start to feel like the results of a random generator programmed to spit out scenarios that vaguely seem as if they fit into the world of Joe Goldberg and his you-kind-of-do-have-to-suspend-your-disbelief-a-little life, without taking into consideration whether or not there are narratively satisfying transitions tying these scenarios together.

Notably, the main through line in You Love Me is an engagement with current feminist discourse that wasn’t present in the first two books. This, at first, might strike readers as interesting, especially given that Joe is the one who engages with this discourse. For example, he examines his reverence for the films of Woody Allen at the behest of Mary Kay’s best friend, Melanda, a diehard feminist who frequently espouses her sociopolitical opinions.

The overt inclusion of feminist discourse feels gimmicky, and eventually falls through entirely, mostly because of the narrator that Kepnes chooses to engage with said discourse. And given that You Love Me falls into the horror/thriller genre, its explicit conversation with the #MeToo movement comes off more as an attempt at adding gratuitous shock value to the story than something that contains real substance and social value. What is the value of using sexual abuse and assault as plot points when you’re telling a story about a male serial killer that manipulates and uses women as he pleases?

In You, Joe Goldberg was as textbook serial killer as a character can get. Now, in You Love Me, it seems like the story is doing too much to try and make Joe out to be more than just his “hidden bodies.” But there is no “cool” motive—only murder.

You Love Me is the third installment in the You series, which I have become obsessed with over the past year or so. I was not expecting to love this one more than the first or even the second book, but it absolutely surprised me in the best way possible. You Love Me is my favorite book in the series (so far? I’m keeping my eyes peeled for an announcement about a fourth book), which follows Joe once again in a new town where he falls in love with another woman. Joe has always fascinated me; there are times when I can’t help but root for him to make it out in the end, but I’m also wondering how one man can be so good at getting away with everything he does. As someone who loves psychological books, the You series has been captivating to me from the very beginning when I picked up the first book over a year ago. You Love Me is one of my favorite books of the year so far; now I’m hoping season 3 of the You show will be just as great when it comes out!

A huge thank you to NetGalley and Random House for the ARC of You Love Me by Caroline Kepnes!

Well, I never thought I’d say this but…POOR JOE!!!!! Definitely on par with the first book. I love that in this world of wacky drama that Ms. Kepnes (and Joe) could still make me laugh out loud. I think what surprised me the most this time around was that even with all the c-r-a-z-y, and all the oh. no. that. did. not. just. happen moments, there was actually a quite beautiful love story woven in.

I received an eARC of You Love Me by Caroline Kepnes from Random House Publishing Group and NetGalley in exchange for an honest review. Thank you!
5 raving stars!!! The You series has been fantastic so far and I have a feeling this isn't the last time we will read about Joe. I was thrilled to read the next installment. Caroline Kepnes has outdone herself! I highly recommend this series!