Forman, Gayle. (2015). I Was Here. Great Britain, London: Simon & Schuster.
"I regret to inform you that I have had to take my own life." That is the first line of Meg Garcia's suicide note, sent to her friends and family on a time-delayed email. By the time they realize what she's done, it's too late to help her.
Cody has been Meg's best friend since childhood, and is haunted by guilt in the weeks following her death. How could she have not seen this coming?
On the behest of Meg's parents, Cody drives to the University of Washington to pick up Meg's belongings. Once there she begins to investigate the mystery of her friend's death, suspecting that someone else was involved in Meg's decision to end her life.
Like The Nest, the story is told in first-person narration, but is also written in present tense, giving events an immediacy that suits the YA target audience. The author confronts the issue of suicide head-on, but also references drug use, sex and parental abuse.
Forman doesn’t flinch from the difficulties Cody faces in coming to grips with her friend's suicide, and never speaks down to her audience. Using the first-person narrative means Cody's thoughts and feelings are conveyed directly to the reader, and Foreman provides a sense of hope and closure to her narrative without a trite happy ending.
Hiya, I'm Sharlene, a 72276 classmate. This is a great review. I've read the If I Stay duology by Gayle Forman. It was fantastic. This is definitely on my TBR. If you haven't picked up on it, you're misspelling Forman in the review posted here. When submitting, make sure it's spelled right. Especially the reference :) don't wanna lose points for something so small like that!
ReplyDeleteI'm a book blogger. Come check out my page sometime. It's http://sharlenesays.com/
Thanks for the tip; I've removed the offending "e"!
Delete