Reading Response: Where She Went

The book Where She Went is the sequel to the story of a girl, Mia, who had to chose whether she wanted to join her family and give up, or stay and work with the problems her life has become. The sequel, though, is in the perspective of Mia’s boyfriend and how he deals with the loss of Mia and what his life has become. I think the author, Gayle Forman, does a really great job of portraying how it’s okay for people to be somewhat vulnerable in terms of their lives being an utter mess.

Forman represents disasters through Mia and Adam’s lives throughout the book. Now she does this by having the story evolve around Mia, but has the perspective of the book be with Adam. For example, she shows how Adam’s life was a mess with, “I have the kind of life a lot of people would probably sell a kidney to just experience a bit of [his band went to fame]. But still, I find the need to remind myself the temporariness of every day.” This very clearly represents his place in the book since this was in the very first paragraph of the book. This shows that the condition in which he lives in doesn’t cause this depression of his, but it’s what happened in his past with Mia. Now, obviously Mia had to deal with her family’s death, but the way she described it, like how she momentarily forgot her parents were dead every morning, really showed the depth of the situation. The depth in the pain of the experience in the end.

Now after this part of the book is revealed as they reunite, Forman shows how Mia and Adam give up and start arguing, but the thing is they start spilling all that was bottled up for 3 years, and are actually vulnerable for once. In the process, it’s shown to be for the better. For example, Mia confessed that, “I need to tell you everything. I just think I need some coffee before I can get it together enough to explain.” This shows that even though it was hard for her, she knew that sooner or later she’d have to explain what happened in their past, and that meant being vulnerable to him for the first time after her family died. In return Adam does the same stating, “I don’t remember the last time I’ve cried but… the floodgates open and I’m sobbing now...in front of the whole damn world.” And this goes for the better, as all secrets are out, all the grudges that were held are slowly resolving, and now there’s an actual chance for them to be in each other's lives now that the problem has been confronted.

All in all, Gayle Forman does a skillful job of expressing the step-by-step process of dealing with loss, shutting out the people you love, confronting the problem as a whole, and losing the fear of being vulnerable throughout the context of this story.