Saturday 21 February 2015

Book Review - If I Stay by Gayle Forman | ★★★

I decided to make two seperate reviews of If I stay and Where She Went by Gayle Forman. 

Mia is a seventeen year old girl, who is, except for her talent in playing the cello, pretty normal. She has a good shot at attending Julliard, a boyfriend, who also is a musican but playing the guitar in a rock band, a best friend and a family everybody could wish for. On a snowy day school is cancelled and her family decides to go visit their best friends who recently got a kid. But on this day Mia's life and dreams of becoming a famous cellist are shattered. On the way the family's car collides with another. Right after the accident, Mia finds herself somewhere between life and death. From outside her badly injured body, she sees the hugeness of the crash and later follows  the events at the hospital. Her Parents died instantly and her brother makes it to the hospital but doesn´t survive. 


Between telling what goes on around her comatose body, Mia shares important or just happy moments from her life. A nurse whispers to her, that it´s her decision if she wants to fight for her life or join her family. On one side there is Mia´s grandfather, who has lost his son but still tells his granddoughter that it´s alright if she wants to die and end the pain, and on the other one is her boyfriend who begs her to stay alive. She has to consider her choice carefully.

"What would it feel like to wake up an orphan? To never smell dad smoke a pipe? To never stand next to Mom quietly talking as we do the dishes? To never read Teddy another chapter of Harry Potter? To stay without them? I´m not sure this is a world I belong in anymore. I´m not sure that I want to wake up."

I have to admit, I cried. So I think Gayle Forman did a good job. The characters were likable from the beginning, sometimes almost too perfect. In my opinion the best thing about it was that Mia thinks about her past in order to try to figure out whether she should live or die, although she didn´t think enough about what life would be in the future when she decides to stay, I missed that part a lot. I recommend that book, but not as highly as I wished I could.

Rating:
★★★