I have finally started reading again! It had been a few months to be honest, but primarily because I didn't have a book that I was all that excited about. If I stay was the first book in a long time that I have truly devoured...started it late on a Friday night and finished it the next day.
I don't want to spoil it...but if I'm honest, you find out this bit that I'm about to share really early on. However, if you don't want me to spoil any part of the book, then you better stop reading this post immediately.
Within the first chapter or so, the main character, Mia, is in a terrible car accident. Her mom and dad are pronounced dead on the scene, and her little brother dies later at the hospital, leaving her as the only survivor. She's basically left to decide if she should stay and continue to live without her parents and brother or if she should go and die and be with them. What a choice right? So much grief surrounds both decisions - I can't even imagine!
And as Peter and Jack passed me on the freeway - on our way to separate destinations, I literally thought my entire heart just drove away. I know a little extreme, but it's how I felt at that moment. And I almost started crying in the car thinking about getting a call stating that they had been in a car accident and that they had both died. Ugh...how would I move on? How do you get through something like that? Peter kindly reminded me that I would have LB2, which made me even more emotional seeing as if this morbid thought came true, LB2 would never know his dad or his brother. Ugh...it hurts just thinking about it.
And the reality is, of course it hurts. Of course you would grieve, but ultimately you have a choice to move on from that grief or to live in it. And my hope and prayer is that Jesus would give me the strength and the courage to move on from that grief...to embrace this new life.
So what would you choose? And what do you think Mia chooses? I mean I suppose it's kind of obvious once I tell you that there is a second book, Where She Went, and she's not writing it from the grave. Anyhow, it is such a beautiful story about family and love and life. And it truly makes you appreciate this gift of life and the sincere value in family.
Any book recommendations?
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