Better or worse than the first on? I'm not sure...

Where She Went
von Gayle Forman

The novel:

Three years after the horrible accident when Mia lost her whole family and nearly died herself, three years after she left Adam and walked out of his life forever - a break up that Adam never seemed to recover from -, the two of them are living on opposite coasts of the USA, both rising stars in the music branche: Mia with her Cello at Julliard and Adam as a Punk Rock Star with his band Shooting Star. Spending some time in New York, Adam visits a concert of Mia one evening, and after that they spend the night together, explopring the city that has become Mias new home. A night that offers them a chance to talk about what happened to them and about how their lifes could have changend in ways they never had expected.

Comment:

Instead of the first novel this one is written from Adams point of view, what I liked very much, cause I never got a complete picture of Adam and the way he feels in the first book, when Mia just describes the time they spent together. At first I didn't like that novel much cause I was so disappointed by the two main characters. I just couldn't understand the way Mia acted and why she had left Adam after she woke up because she had woken up just because of HIM. And Adam turned into a total asshole what might be comprehensible by thinking about what he's been through after the break-up with Mia, but I used to like him so much and he just wasn't Adam anymore. And the night they spent together was just so weird cause the just acted like nothing has ever happened between them and I just couldn't understand why none of them wanted to talk about the sudden break-up and how they never saw or heard from each other anymore. But when the night was nearly over, Adam finally confronted Mia with all his question and why the heel she'd left him after the accident even without a word of explanation. And now I liked the story but there were just the few last chapters left. Cause now I could understand. Now they showed emotions und talked about feelings and all the sympathies for the two of them came back. The whole story Adam was so full of fury and anger and let everybody feel this and his development to understanding - being able to closure with all of this, being able to let Mia go, to let both of them go - and how this changed his character was so fascinating and emotionally. Exspecially one passage really made me cry:

I made her the promise. The promise that she's held me to. To let her go. I did the right thing. I know it now. I must've always known, but it's been so hard too see through all my anger. And it's okay if she's angry. It's even okay if she hates me. It was selfish what I asked her to do, even if it wound up being the most unselfish thing I've ever done. The most unselfish thing I'll have to KEEP doing. But I'd do it again. I know that now. I'd make that promise a thousand times over and lose her a thousand times over. Just to know that she's somewhere out there. Alive.

Till the end I wasn't sure how the story would end, but it didn't matter cause both options would have been realistic. And after knowing how the novels ends, I also started to like the beginning, which I didn't like at first. Cause it was realistic. Now I can understand the way Mia acted and I can understand why Adam turned into an asshole and I like that they broke up after the accident cause it's just AUTHENTIC. What happened to them was just life and I think the ways their lives turned to be like is just the way real life would turn to be like too. It's different from other romatic love stories, it's not kitschy and trashy, it's realistic - I mentioned that already when I read the first novel and now it's again what I liked most.