Summer Shenanigans

“And I asked myself about the present: how wide it was, how deep it was, how much was mine to keep.”

-Kurt Vonnegut.

June has finally come to a close and with that summer is slowly ebbing away leaving way for monsoon to draw in. Decidedly, I had kept a book aside which I had gotten last year for the summer of 2017. I intended to get it done with by May but it didn’t happen and when I realised July is about to begin in a few days I stopped piling it for the next month and picked it up. June wouldn’t have been anymore good without the queen of summer contemporary, Morgan Matson’s Since You’ve Been Gone.

The Kelly Clarkson song inspired book title follows the story of Emily who finds her best friend, Sloane, missing without any notice just when summer is about to begin. Incidentally, Emily finds a letter left by Sloane scribbled with the things she has to do. Assuming the tasks would lead her to her best friend, she starts considering the tasks enlisted but…

Kiss a stranger? Umm…No..ugh

Sleep under the stars? WOW… done!

Go Skinny-Dipping? Wait… whaaaat!???!!!

All these cumbersome mileposts without Sloane to guide her or be there with her?

“…sometimes staying free required unimaginable sacrifice.”

-Yaa Gyasi

 

To begin with, I cannot begin to describe how much I adored the cover of this book! The cover showered vibes of summer with greenery, ice-cream, pizza, clear skies, the girls moving about giggling and the fonts; it is so gorgeous that I could stare at it forever.

Moving toward the content of the book, I liked the story a lot. I was worried when it was apparent that I had started to reach the end because I didn’t want it to end so soon. Matson’s writing is like butter sliding along the edges of a sharp knife; it is smooth and doesn’t make you feel lost at all. Additionally, the book is pinned with a couple of playlists which kept me even more excited. In spite of such praises, I gave this book a 4.75/5 stars on goodreads because of the lack of diversity in the book. Considering the fact that it is a Young Adult Contemporary book written a few years ago, it didn’t have the theme of diversity we want authors of the present day to talk about. There was no presence of people of other colour or races other than white Americans, there was no mention of any LGBTQ characters; this was book all white and heteronormative and Christian just like all her other books which is totally a turn-off factor for a reader like me who loves books that subsume a variety of characters. Anyway, I would recommend the book despite the minor faults as it will make you smile and jiggle with happiness with every turn of the page, i.e. if you are looking for a teenage fiction with friendship, love and family.