Friday, June 13, 2014

Where She Went by Gayle Forman


Confession – I knew that there was a sequel to If I Stay before I actually read it, so in a way I already knew that she was going to live. However, what I didn’t expect was Where She Went actually was.

Three years is a long time, I know because I like using the number three (days, months, years) in my writing, but for Adam it’s an eternity. The man who narrates this novel is not the guy who you saw during If I Stay. Things have changed. His band has become huge. He’s fighting with the band. He’s smoking. He’s got anxiety issues. And what a lot of readers will probably find the most important change of all, he’s dating a woman named Bryn who is a famous actress.

Yeah, that’s right. Bryn. Not Mia, but Bryn. After getting through the twenty pages that make up the first chapter, I had to wonder: what the hell happened to Adam? Answer? Well, you have to read the rest of the book to figure it out.

Adam is stuck in New York, a layover day to take care of some last minute business (plus he hates to fly now, because of his anxiety) and he needs a break from everything. So he wanders the city and as usual, Fate intervenes, sending him past a concert hall where Mia is playing. He goes in and listens to her concert and afterwards she calls him back to meet with her; starting the longest night of his life.

I loved this book, possibly even more than the first one, which is probably really odd. The original is always supposed to get the most love, right? But this one…this one was amazing. I loved the fact that after the events in If I Stay there wasn’t a happy ending…at least not right away. I loved that Adam and Mia went through so much, it made it somehow sweeter when they did finally get together at the end of this book. Did it happen a little too quickly? Possibly, but after the lengthy conversation that they had that night and morning… Well, I’m not sure what else there was to say.

Final Rating: 5 out of 5 stars. Another quick read. Another amazing book about pain and loss and how what doesn’t kill you makes you stronger, even if you don’t realize it right away.

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