Available: Everywhere books are sold. I got my copy from the library.
Synopsis:
Madison Stanton doesn’t know where she is or how she got there. But she does know this – she is dead. And alone in a vast, dark space. The only company Maddy has in this place are luminescent objects that turn out to be all the things she lost while she was alive. And soon she discovers that, with these artifacts, she can reexperience – and even change – moments from her life.
Her first kiss.
A trip to Disney World.
Her sister’s wedding.
A disastrous sleepover.
In reliving these moments, Maddy learns illuminating and frightening truths about her life – and death.
Review:
I really, really liked this book. It took what could have been an interesting but not so original plot and made it into so much more. We are introduced to Maddy when she’s already dead. And it is through her navigation of erm…deadliness that the entire story is told.
I love it when books are told in non-linear interesting ways. When authors play with timelines, experimenting with expressions and impressions – it makes me really, very happy. Ms. Huntley’s infuses the story with (pardon the pun) with a whole new life by telling the story in bursts of memory. She creates a sort of web of events which are so intricately connected to each other, that in the end, you are left a little breathless at the beauty of it.
About the characterization – we get Maddy from a distance but we don’t just see Maddy as she is (actually, we sort of can’t) we see her as she was, before she died, when she was a child, when she barely existing. The range is simply amazing.
The romance is real – complete with insecurity and a bit of paranoia. And while it is not the most important aspect of the novel, it holds a lot of weight – it’s secondary without any of the negative connotations associated with the word. All in all, if you haven’t read this book, please do. It is beautiful.
