If I Stay (Gayle Forman)

Title: If I Stay

Author: Gayle Forman

Publisher: Penguin Audio

Length: Audiobook: 4 hours

Rating: 4/5

After an car wreck kills the rest of her family, 17-year old Mia must choose between staying and coping with her enormous grief, or leaving her body and joining her family.

Normally I don’t like books that deal with death. I like escapism rather than realism. But this book was beautifully done. In the audiobook format, I really got a sense of Mia’s voice and the character came to life under actress Kirsten Potter’s portrayal.

While this book was haunting and tragic, it was also quite beautiful. We meet Mia as the catastrophe occurs, and then through flashbacks, learn her story and become quite attached to her as she decides whether to stay or go. This book will make you take a long look at how you value family, love, choice, and life. 

Every Day (David Levithan)

Title: Every Day

Author: David Levithan

Publisher: Alfred A. Knopf

Length: 322 pages

Rating: 4.5/5

Imagine waking up each day in a new body, getting to experience new things, but never having a chance at a future with the people you meet. This is A’s life, and to survive such a strange existence A has made certain guidelines: don’t get too attached, don’t interfere, and don’t get noticed. When A wakes up in Justin’s body and meets Justin’s girlfriend, Rhiannon, everything changes. As A falls in love with Rhiannon and begins changing all the rules to spend more time with her, A comes dangerously close to exposing A’s secret existence.

This book’s premise is brilliant and completely unique. It will make you question what it means to be human, mind and body separate but all in one. What is the importance of the vessel that carries your personality? What if you could experience living in every type of body, if boy or girl, fat or skinny, that person for the day was you? I know I took a good look at my own automatic judgment of people based on their looks. This book challenged me to think about gender differently too. It was extremely difficult to write the book summary without using gendered pronoun (and I admit it’s still awkward!). But all of this led to the expanded importance of the first person narrator being and knowing exactly who they are, despite changing all the time..

This book also brings up the question of what it means to truly love someone every day. I felt for Rhiannon as much as I did for A, because they both have such tough decisions to make.

Every Day is YA fiction on the next level; and I love the way it challenges and stretches the norm.