Find Great Books to Read!
Here’s one suggestion. For extra credit, write a paragraph or more about a book YOU would recommend. Add it in the comments suggestion on this page. Be sure to include the title and the author!
If I Stay by Gayle Forman
The book review below is an excerpt from a review written by a teacher, Brian Kelly. I’ve also read and would recommend to someone looking for a good book. This book is going to be made into a movie too.
A young, talented cellist, Mia, is in a state between life and death. The novel If I Stay brings us into her experience as her soul, independent from her bandaged, bloodied body, watches family and friends visit her in the hospital. Are they coming to pay their last respects, or are they coming to see her open her eyes?
Pacing the hospital floors, sitting in a chair near her body, her spirit recounts important moments in her life while, at the same time, also learns most of those closest to her have passed on to the afterlife. They did not stay.
Realizing she will be without her family if she stays, Mia leans heavily towards not staying: accepting death and joining her love ones. She resolves the situation within herself and chooses. Yet, she doesn’t know how to do it. How to let go, or even how to dig her heels in and stay for that matter. She can’t walk through walls or float. No one can see or hear her. She is stuck and watches and listens and thinks and remembers.
Two powerful moments stand out. Her grandfather, her father’s dad, who has just lost his son, daughter-in-law, and grandson, weeps onto her and whispers into her ear that it is ok if she wants to go. He understands. He doesn’t like it, but he understands.
Second, Mia’s love, Adam, also a musician, finally overcomes a series of obstacles and reaches her side. He too whispers a message in her ear, “I’ll let you go. If you stay.” Meaning, he won’t resist her accepting the scholarship to Julliard or anything else life presents her with.
The recurring theme that people on the verge of death can hear their loves one speak to them, and need it, is interesting. All of the nurses in the story seem to know and believe that Mia can hear, and she can also choose. She can choose if she goes or if she stays.
