Book Review: Just One Day by Gayle Forman

Release Date: August 20, 2013

Publisher: Speak

Pages: 400

Received: Barnes and Noble

Star Rating: ★ ★ ★ ☆ ☆

Summary:

                          Allyson Healey's life is exactly like her suitcase—packed, planned, ordered. Then on the last day of her three-week post-graduation European tour, she meets Willem. A free-spirited, roving actor, Willem is everything she’s not, and when he invites her to abandon her plans and come to Paris with him, Allyson says yes. This uncharacteristic decision leads to a day of risk and romance, liberation and intimacy: 24 hours that will transform Allyson’s life.

My Thoughts:

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Actual Rating: 3.5/5

"We are born in one day. We die in one day. We can change in one day. And we can fall in love in one day. Anything can happen in just one day." –Gayle Forman in Just One Day

I do believe this book was good, don’t get me wrong. If you read Forman’s previous novels If I Stayand Where She Went, You must have been expecting good things(like me). I think it was my high hopes of the hype around this book gave me the C average rating.

Allyson was a typical narrator. Always thinks smart, the girl who played it safe, and then she meets Willem and he unlocks a side of her that she herself didn’t know existed. Am I the only one who thinks this? But Allyson was enjoyable, sometimes. Now Allyson is on a tour and Paris got cancelled. Why not except a cute stranger’s request to take me for a day? Well I understand Allyson’s need to go to Paris, so I guess I wouldn’t take down a free pass to Paris!

The plot goes on and on. I guess you can call it a little fun? But it was the ending that I knew there was going to be a sequel. But the sequel doesn’t count as a sequel. More like a companion novel! 

The whole book wasn’t a total let down. (Not talking about how much Willem isn’t my favorite character at ALL). It makes you hope and dream and fall in love with not just the characters, but with Paris and the kindness of strangers. I’m not continuing this duology, but I’m looking forward to what Gayle Forman has in store in the future.

3.5/5 STARS