Monday, July 21, 2014

If I Stay by Gayle Forman

Seventeen year old Mia has a pretty great life.  She has a loving family, a great boyfriend, and is pretty sure she will be accepted to Juilliard for the fall semester. On one unexpected snow day, her family decides to go for a drive and everything changes.  They are hit head on by an oncoming vehicle and Mia is the lone survivor.  Shortly after the accident Mia realizes that she is having an "out of body" experience as she witnesses her comatose body being loaded into the ambulance.  As her extended family members and friends gather at the hospital waiting for her to wake, Mia has to decide if she actually wants to go on living.   
My Thoughts:  
I have wanted to read a Gayle Forman book for a while and decided on this one since the movie is coming out later this summer.  Maybe it was because I had pretty high expectations, but I was a little disappointed.  While I don't want to give away the ending, I felt that it really left me hanging.  I also had a hard time with the concept of Mia walking around in a ghost-like form trying to decide if she wanted to live or die.  While I believe that many young adult novels can be enjoyed by people of all ages, I am coming to find that some are just not for me as an adult.