A review by beckyyreadss
If He Had Been with Me by Laura Nowlin

dark emotional sad slow-paced
  • Plot- or character-driven? Character
  • Strong character development? No
  • Loveable characters? It's complicated
  • Diverse cast of characters? No
  • Flaws of characters a main focus? Yes

4.0

I wanted to read this book as I had seen it all over the book community and I love books that make me want to cry. This book was emotional but didn’t make me cry, I just spent half of my time rolling my eyes due to teenage pining and the biggest issue is that they were still a virgin and loved their boyfriend.  

This book is based on Autumn. Her best friend was Finn and they used to be inseparable. But then something changed. Or they changed. Now, they do their best to ignore each other. Autumn has her boyfriend Jamie, and her close-knit group of friends. And Finn has become that boy at school, the one everyone wants to be around. That still doesn’t stop the way Autumn feels every time she and Finn cross paths, and the growing nagging thought that maybe things could have been different. Maybe they should be together. But come August, things will change forever. And as time passes, Autumn will be forced to confront how else life might have been different if they had never parted ways. This book is a contemporary young adult book.  

Even though I rated it four stars, it was the final ten chapters that made me rate the book four stars. Yes, the ending was sad, and it was all heartbreaking and melancholy, and it was the ending no one wanted but we knew it was coming from the first page. Autumn ended up growing on me and by the end I really felt for her, and I wanted to give her a hug. But I wanted to hug their mums more. I would have loved this to be multiple POV with Finn and their mums. Their mums went through a whole lot of shit and yes it affected Autumn and Finn, but I just felt for them especially with the ending.  

However, even though I was sad about the ending and the events of this book, it took a mountain to get to that point. All of the middle bit was a bit forgettable, to the point where I'm probably not going to remember it in a week. I was rolling my eyes through all the petty high school drama that wasn’t needed and yes Autumn took a while to grow on me, but she annoyed the crap out of me at the beginning with the whole tiara thing and the way the writing was about the seasonal depression just sort of rubbed me the wrong way. I usually love the deception of mental health in books, but this was just needed a bit of work.  

Overall, even though it was a mission to finish, I enjoyed it. I’ve seen that there is a second book in the series, and I don’t know how it’s going to go, but we will find out.  
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