If I stay is a 2009 young adult novel by Gayle Forman who began her career writing for Seventeen Magazine. The film adaptation under the same title, starring young generation star Chloë Grace Moretz in another incarnation, is now showcasing in cinemas. Back to the book’s pages where it all started, the story deals with aftermaths of a tragic car accident and out-of-body experience of 17-year old musician Mia laying in a coma.
Music is a central part of the story and events spin around it on their orbits. Like with other books that would pick up a certain sensation or theme and develop it into a prevailing mean of expression for the story to be told, be it smell/scent for Perfume by Patrick Süskind, If I Stay builds its uniqueness on associating moments of life, both trivial and important, with sounds of the music. There is an exploration of genres, styles and music eras within the book. While it will not necessarily talk to everyone’s senses as tin ear is not a matter of choice and it proves difficult to translate music’s complexity and emotionality into words, everyone should at least be able to read the story’s universal message. Life, love and death happen just like that and can be abruptly finished, like a powerful song that fills the room and leaves it silently empty if suddenly stopped. One minute it is there, the next it is gone, even though the goosebumps on the skin still have not worn off.
Let’s not forget – the music is also the background of Mia’s love story. She plays classical music, Adam – popular, but when they get together, when those two different worlds clash and collide, they create a new amazing symphony of sounds. Their relationship is as normal as one can be, idyllic at times but they have their little problems too. In fact, everything goes well till Mia starts looking more seriously into her future as a cellist. There is a chance couple’s ways will part because of the music that bonded them at first, but Mia dreads to make any final decision. Cruel fate comes in aid, being the least expected answer to her reluctance. As they say: sometimes we make choices and other times choices make us. Mia’s choice is taken away, one event washes away the life she knew. She almost wishes she could face her past issues again as they seem less scary now, when she wonders whether to die or continue the life in its new shape, far more difficult than she ever anticipated.
The book will appeal the most to younger readers experiencing their first big-love dramas. Forgetting predictability, there is a great deal of romantic nicely executed moments. Many high school girls might think that they wished to be Mia before the accident and will get hooked up on wondering whether they would choose joining their family in afterlife or staying with oh-so-serious love of their seventeen years long lives.
One should realise that the book describes events taking place over 24 hours and 7 minutes, according to chapters’ titles that specify timing. Even though a numerous retrospections are woven into the plot, the fact that one day events are talked through 200 pages is sort of mind-blowing. Mastery or opposite? The book is easy to take in and proves to be more of a quick-read which, perhaps, does not speak in favour of its intended depth. Its strongest part is exploration of characters’ personalities through all sorts of everyday situations; marking the life most important moments and milestones, and sometimes slowing down to recall something completely random and ordinary. Perhaps it does not make up for the most outstanding family and friends’ portrait ever but it creates an authentic one.
Overall, missing out on this book would not be a crime, but giving it a chance is not a complete waste of time too. Let’s not diminish utterly the book’s potential – some surely will find the story gripping and transcendent but in the long run book turns out not nearly as revolutionary as one might have thought it would be. However, indications of music add another dimension to the narrative, creating a unique atmosphere.