Review: If I Stay By: Gayle Forman

Title: If I Stay

Author: Gayle Forman

Published: April 2nd, 2009

Series: If I stay

My Rating: 5 out of 5 stars!!!

Goodreads Summary:

In a single moment, everything changes. Seventeen year- old Mia has no memory of the accident; she can only recall riding along the snow-wet Oregon road with her family. Then, in a blink, she finds herself watching as her own damaged body is taken from the wreck...

A sophisticated, layered, and heartachingly beautiful story about the power of family and friends, the choices we all make -and the ultimate choice Mia commands

My Thoughts:

So, first things first, I have seen so many great reviews on this book and I have been afraid to read it because I have heard how emotional it is. I am a emotional and sensitive person and I cry so easily and I knew that this book would evoke so much emotion from me and it definitely did.

Mia is going with her family to visit friends on any other day when her family's car is in an accident. But, she can see her body and she is not in it. She is not dead, she knows because she is seeing the paramedics take her away and witnissing everything outside of her physical self. She is stuck in the in between and faced with facts of should I stay or should I go?

I really enjoyed this book, as you get to know Mia, her friends, and her family through flashbacks of Mia's life, you begin to fall in love with each character and see what their lives mean to Mia. I loved the flashbacks of her parents and her brother really getting to see how close her and her family were and intertwining the reader into Mia's decision and feeling her heartbreak of losing them. Her parents were the "cool" parents, the one's that all of friends were jealous of and wished that their parents were that way too.  You get to meet her boyfriend Adam and see their relationship through her eyes and grow into one of those once in a lifetime loves. Adam made my heart melt, he was the kind of boyfriend every girl who die to have, taking Mia to do things that she loved even though he didn't love the same things and was always pushing her to be a better and stronger person.

The other aspect of this book that I loved was the incoporation of music. Mia is a cello player, an amazing one at that and music is so connected to who she is and every relationship she has with her family and friends. Adam is in a band called Shooting Stars that is starting to take off and you get to see how music effects their relationships and how much it is a part of it.

I definitely recommend this book to anyone who loves a good romance and wants to go on an emotional roller coaster. I am now reading the second book, Where She Went which goes through the aftermath of the decison that Mia made, Review coming soon!

Happy Reading!

Kristin