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3.94 AVERAGE
3.94 AVERAGE
[Review originally posted on Rather Be Reading]
Tomorrow is a day all book readers need to rejoice, rush to the closest bookstore, purchase a copy of Just One Day, and read it in its entirety. I am not kidding, not in the least. This book is probably one of my very favorite books I’ve read … ever.
Forman took me by complete surprise with her previous books, If I Stay and Where She Went. There are moments I still reflect on scenes from those books and find myself daydreaming about the characters. It’s always a bit scary to read something new when an author leaves that kind of impression. Regardless, Jamie and Anna talked up Just One Day and graciously sent it my way.
Within the first few pages, the confused and very structured main character, Allyson, had struck a chord with me. Her life was controlled and micromanaged by overbearing parents who planned every second of her life. It’s not until the end of her tour in Europe that she realizes how little she’s explored because she was too afraid to do something not on the itinerary (meanwhile, her best friend, Melanie, has made new friends and semi-reinvented herself).
When the chance to go to Paris for a day with Willem (a boy she meets through a local production of a Shakespeare play) arises, she pushes her hesitations aside and chooses to be adventurous. Willem is funny, intelligent, good-looking, and has a wandering spirit that’s up for the challenge of showing Allyson the city. Allyson morphs into an alter-ego, Lulu, who is the bold and daring version of herself. The girl that’s brave and doesn’t need to have every moment pre-planned.
Forman’s writing is beautiful and perfect; her prose is spot on. Her descriptions are vivid — painting clear pictures of the places they went, the people they encountered, the sights they saw. Though I may have expected a “touristy” and overly romantic trek through Paris, what I received was so much more than that. Their stops felt very realistic and not overly idealized. I loved that I didn’t receive the postcard description of the city, but experienced two people discovering themselves in a foreign city in a very natural way. Nothing feels forced, cliched, or contrived.
Maybe you’re like me and you assumed that Just One Day would be mostly an epic love story. Forman’s themes are so strong, making me believe that her words could reach a vast audience.
+ JOD is about a pressured, sheltered girl with high demands being forced on her by her parents (Go to med school. Make something of yourself. Collect clocks. Wear these clothes.) and how she struggles to break free of the mold they’ve so tightly cast around her.
+ It’s about the separation and distance we face when we part from our childhood friends to chase new dreams. (How do you remain friends when it seems life is pulling you in two opposite directions?)
+ There’s the sense of change and wanting to chase after something new and different and acting on it, even though (or maybe especially because) everyone expects you to stay the same.
+ It’s about making friends as an adult and how different that can be than the judgmental ways of high school… and how our preconceived notions of someone can be so, so wrong.
There are no words to describe my love/adoration/infatuation for Just One Day. One day can change the course of your life. I wish I could purchase copies for every person on the planet because it has affected me that immensely.
I highly encourage you, friends, to go out tomorrow and purchase a copy of this book. Allow yourself to fall in love with Paris, to seek answers to all the questions surrounding Willem, and to grow and change with Allyson.
Tomorrow is a day all book readers need to rejoice, rush to the closest bookstore, purchase a copy of Just One Day, and read it in its entirety. I am not kidding, not in the least. This book is probably one of my very favorite books I’ve read … ever.
Forman took me by complete surprise with her previous books, If I Stay and Where She Went. There are moments I still reflect on scenes from those books and find myself daydreaming about the characters. It’s always a bit scary to read something new when an author leaves that kind of impression. Regardless, Jamie and Anna talked up Just One Day and graciously sent it my way.
Within the first few pages, the confused and very structured main character, Allyson, had struck a chord with me. Her life was controlled and micromanaged by overbearing parents who planned every second of her life. It’s not until the end of her tour in Europe that she realizes how little she’s explored because she was too afraid to do something not on the itinerary (meanwhile, her best friend, Melanie, has made new friends and semi-reinvented herself).
When the chance to go to Paris for a day with Willem (a boy she meets through a local production of a Shakespeare play) arises, she pushes her hesitations aside and chooses to be adventurous. Willem is funny, intelligent, good-looking, and has a wandering spirit that’s up for the challenge of showing Allyson the city. Allyson morphs into an alter-ego, Lulu, who is the bold and daring version of herself. The girl that’s brave and doesn’t need to have every moment pre-planned.
Forman’s writing is beautiful and perfect; her prose is spot on. Her descriptions are vivid — painting clear pictures of the places they went, the people they encountered, the sights they saw. Though I may have expected a “touristy” and overly romantic trek through Paris, what I received was so much more than that. Their stops felt very realistic and not overly idealized. I loved that I didn’t receive the postcard description of the city, but experienced two people discovering themselves in a foreign city in a very natural way. Nothing feels forced, cliched, or contrived.
Maybe you’re like me and you assumed that Just One Day would be mostly an epic love story. Forman’s themes are so strong, making me believe that her words could reach a vast audience.
+ JOD is about a pressured, sheltered girl with high demands being forced on her by her parents (Go to med school. Make something of yourself. Collect clocks. Wear these clothes.) and how she struggles to break free of the mold they’ve so tightly cast around her.
+ It’s about the separation and distance we face when we part from our childhood friends to chase new dreams. (How do you remain friends when it seems life is pulling you in two opposite directions?)
+ There’s the sense of change and wanting to chase after something new and different and acting on it, even though (or maybe especially because) everyone expects you to stay the same.
+ It’s about making friends as an adult and how different that can be than the judgmental ways of high school… and how our preconceived notions of someone can be so, so wrong.
There are no words to describe my love/adoration/infatuation for Just One Day. One day can change the course of your life. I wish I could purchase copies for every person on the planet because it has affected me that immensely.
I highly encourage you, friends, to go out tomorrow and purchase a copy of this book. Allow yourself to fall in love with Paris, to seek answers to all the questions surrounding Willem, and to grow and change with Allyson.
I feel like my heart has been broken and built back up a hundred times while reading this. What a journey. Full book buddies review to come!
You know how, after reading a disappointing YA novel, we list a bunch of things we wish the author had done...well, Gayle Forman actually does them. Just One Day is a coming-of-age story. It's about a girl who meets a boy on a train. She abandons her plans and they spend a day together in Paris. In one day, the girl lets slip all of her inhibitions and takes chances; confesses thoughts that have never until now fully made themselves known; and begins to hope for a future she never realized she wanted. And then it is taken away from her. At the brink of a new beginning, it is ended. The girl leaves a lot of herself in Paris, in that one night, with that boy. The struggle now is to learn to live on, to move on. Only she can't.
Forman sculpts compelling characters. I say this because Allyson is an ordinary girl. A little scared, a little sheltered, a little unlived. But, like she says, and like so many of us, she feels there is this other girl inside, another girl who is brave and outspoken, a girl who dares. Only she is trapped somehow. Like so many of us, she wants to set her free. And this is what Forman captures for us to witness: Allyson's expansion, the moment she finally reaches out, stretches out, to touch life.
Allyson's relationships with other characters are developed. Forman is able to grasp and portray the awkward and sometimes regretful consequences of becoming an adult. Allyson's strained and frustrated dynamic with her mother, which at times I thought was a little excessive but then again maybe not, after you read the reasons behind her overbearningness. Her friendship with childhood best friend Melanie is beautiful and bittersweet; how friends grow, change and drift away but also how they may drift back. And, of course, her relationship with herself. They are well-written. They all hit the chord of truth.
Her relationship with Willem. It is short and romantic and I missed him when he was gone. There is a little more mystery than I appreciated, too many half smiles for answers and not enough actual explanations. But he had moments, moments when he'd do his thing and observe then say something and I'd think yes, I want those words said to me. What I love most is that their "thing" is about substantial things. They meditate about life, love, and how they see themselves. They talk to each other. They listen to each other. And they mean it.
To be fair, I'm talking about the bare bones here. It isn't entirely free of flaws. For example, I thought little by little, this became akin to a scene of a parade in a romantic comedy -- when the main character decides to brave the world and all her friends clap and march by her side in support with big goofy grins on their faces. The sudden momentum and happy "accidents" Allyson gathers near the end seemed mildly preposterous. Mildly.
Allyson's story isn't special (other than the fact that her self-discovery unfolds in Paris). It is simply about a girl trying to find herself. About a girl who wakes up one day and realizes she wants more, more, more. But she doesn't know how. How do you make friends? How do you just close your eyes, pick a place and go? How do you just take what you want instead of waiting it to be offered to you? How do you even figure out what you want in the first place?
Familiar questions. We ask ourselves the same. And we all have whims and fancies, we have imaginations and daydreams. But then responsibilities and duties get in the way. What this book offers is a rejuvenation. That light bounce in our step, that gentle push on our back. That soft voice reminding us to keep looking for our answers.
This review also appears on The Midnight Garden.
Forman sculpts compelling characters. I say this because Allyson is an ordinary girl. A little scared, a little sheltered, a little unlived. But, like she says, and like so many of us, she feels there is this other girl inside, another girl who is brave and outspoken, a girl who dares. Only she is trapped somehow. Like so many of us, she wants to set her free. And this is what Forman captures for us to witness: Allyson's expansion, the moment she finally reaches out, stretches out, to touch life.
Allyson's relationships with other characters are developed. Forman is able to grasp and portray the awkward and sometimes regretful consequences of becoming an adult. Allyson's strained and frustrated dynamic with her mother, which at times I thought was a little excessive but then again maybe not, after you read the reasons behind her overbearningness. Her friendship with childhood best friend Melanie is beautiful and bittersweet; how friends grow, change and drift away but also how they may drift back. And, of course, her relationship with herself. They are well-written. They all hit the chord of truth.
Her relationship with Willem. It is short and romantic and I missed him when he was gone. There is a little more mystery than I appreciated, too many half smiles for answers and not enough actual explanations. But he had moments, moments when he'd do his thing and observe then say something and I'd think yes, I want those words said to me. What I love most is that their "thing" is about substantial things. They meditate about life, love, and how they see themselves. They talk to each other. They listen to each other. And they mean it.
To be fair, I'm talking about the bare bones here. It isn't entirely free of flaws. For example, I thought little by little, this became akin to a scene of a parade in a romantic comedy -- when the main character decides to brave the world and all her friends clap and march by her side in support with big goofy grins on their faces. The sudden momentum and happy "accidents" Allyson gathers near the end seemed mildly preposterous. Mildly.
Allyson's story isn't special (other than the fact that her self-discovery unfolds in Paris). It is simply about a girl trying to find herself. About a girl who wakes up one day and realizes she wants more, more, more. But she doesn't know how. How do you make friends? How do you just close your eyes, pick a place and go? How do you just take what you want instead of waiting it to be offered to you? How do you even figure out what you want in the first place?
Familiar questions. We ask ourselves the same. And we all have whims and fancies, we have imaginations and daydreams. But then responsibilities and duties get in the way. What this book offers is a rejuvenation. That light bounce in our step, that gentle push on our back. That soft voice reminding us to keep looking for our answers.
This review also appears on The Midnight Garden.
I'M HAVING A LOT OF FEELINGS!!! I wanted to scream when I finished. Sadly it is almost 5 in the morning. I'm contemplating not waiting for the library to get the sequel and just buying it. Gah! I'm dying!!!
If you've never read Gayle Forman, you don't know what you are missing. This is a beautiful coming of age story about a girl looking for a boy, who finds herself, and a lot of fabulous friends, along the way. I could not put it down. You should be warned...in typical Forman fashion I was left panting for more at the end. I can't wait to read Willem's story next. Now, who wants to go to Europe with me???
Actual rating: 67%
This frustrated me so much because the beginning was super fun, but then she just moped around. Finally, Allyson decided she would go back to Paris, and there was so much build up, but then she doesn't even find Willem until chapter 38. Willem is found with ANOTHER GIRL, and Allyson is just okay with it? I get that she found peace with the fact that maybe she was just one of many girls, but she just saw him, shrugged it off, and walked away.Then, it ended with her walking up to Willem's door while he stood there in silence!
It would have at least been nice to hear their frikin conversation after waiting for his reasoning for the last 200 pages!!!!
I gave it three stars though, because I loved the beginning day in Paris, Dee, and when Allyson was working at the cafe.
This frustrated me so much because the beginning was super fun, but then she just moped around. Finally, Allyson decided she would go back to Paris, and there was so much build up, but then she doesn't even find Willem until chapter 38. Willem is found with ANOTHER GIRL, and Allyson is just okay with it? I get that she found peace with the fact that maybe she was just one of many girls, but she just saw him, shrugged it off, and walked away.Then, it ended with her walking up to Willem's door while he stood there in silence!
It would have at least been nice to hear their frikin conversation after waiting for his reasoning for the last 200 pages!!!!
I gave it three stars though, because I loved the beginning day in Paris, Dee, and when Allyson was working at the cafe.
Nothing particularly wrong with it and it was interesting enough, however, it felt a bit slow and I felt myself losing interest a few times. Curiosity will make me read Just One Year, nothing else.
4.5 stars
I really liked this so much! I’m surprised by how long I have taken to get to this story but I finally have and I love every moment. I thought that the time when the two were apart would be boring but it really wasn’t. The author had some really good lines in this story really quality writing. I was so happy when she found Celine’s bar I was with her on every minute of her journey. I was also amazed by the strength she had not to interrupt him when she saw him after the show. I thought I would be disappointed by the ending but I actually loved it. I loved how she was able to get a reaction out of him, that was the best part. It made the rest of the book worth it I don’t even need more, just because of the reaction he had to seeing her. That’s just amazing.This took a different kind of story line and I LOVED that, it was different from all the stories that use the exact same plot lines. I’m really surprised thatIm excited to novel onto the next book. This is a really fun story and I’m in it for the long haul.
I really liked this so much! I’m surprised by how long I have taken to get to this story but I finally have and I love every moment. I thought that the time when the two were apart would be boring but it really wasn’t. The author had some really good lines in this story really quality writing. I was so happy when she found Celine’s bar I was with her on every minute of her journey. I was also amazed by the strength she had not to interrupt him when she saw him after the show. I thought I would be disappointed by the ending but I actually loved it. I loved how she was able to get a reaction out of him, that was the best part. It made the rest of the book worth it I don’t even need more, just because of the reaction he had to seeing her. That’s just amazing.This took a different kind of story line and I LOVED that, it was different from all the stories that use the exact same plot lines. I’m really surprised thatIm excited to novel onto the next book. This is a really fun story and I’m in it for the long haul.
It took me awhile to get into this book but when i actually got into it, i was obsessed and couldnt put it down and was so sad that it finished.
I hate the cliffhanger at the end. WHAT DOES WILLEM SAY TO HER? DOES HE LOVE HER TOO? OR WAS HE JUST A DICK WHO LEFT HER?
I cant wait to get my hands on the next book!
I hate the cliffhanger at the end. WHAT DOES WILLEM SAY TO HER? DOES HE LOVE HER TOO? OR WAS HE JUST A DICK WHO LEFT HER?
I cant wait to get my hands on the next book!
This book is exactly what I expected from this author. I loved the character of Allyson, and I don't think that a teenager falling in love in one day is too far fetched. I loved the descriptions of Paris and the coming of age story. I can't wait for Just One Year!