Friday, October 4, 2013

Just One Day by Gayle Forman

2 Stars

Allyson has always been a good girl – never going against the tide or doing anything that would upset her parents.  She’s so good, in fact, that she doesn’t even dare drink with all of her friends while on a post-high school graduation trip to Europe.  When the trip is winding down, Allyson’s friend convinces her to live a little and go see a Shakespeare performance that is not on the itinerary.  At the play Allyson meets Willem – an actor with the troop who offers to spend Allyson’s final day in Europe with her.  When Allyson wakes up from their whirlwind day alone she begins to question every decision she’s made.  “Just One Day” follows Allyson for a year while she tries to discover who she is.

I developed a huge girl-crush on Gayle Forman after reading “If I Stay”.  It was so different and brilliant and I just KNEW my crush would turn in to true love with Forman’s future works.  Unfortunately, “Where She Went” did not resonate quite so deeply with me, but I was not quite ready to give up just yet.  My apologies to all who loved this book, but for me, “Just One Day” was absolutely “meh”.  I don’t tolerate pathetic female lead characters very well, and Allyson was just soooooo pitiful.  One day with a dude who continually reiterates that, for him, it is really just one day of fun and frolicking and she’s going to ruin her entire life over it?  Honey,


Sadly, I believe this will be my last attempt at love with Gayle Forman.  Sadder still, is the fact that I think my opinion might be a bit different if “Just One Day” and “Just One Year” were one book instead of broken into two, but I’m not willing to waste any more of my time on Allyson and Willem’s story.

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