“The Truth about Forever” by Sarah Dessen
Genre: Young Adult Fiction, Contemporary Fiction
Source: Bought
Summary from Goodreads:
Sixteen-year-old Macy Queen is looking forward to a long, boring summer. Her boyfriend is going away. She’s stuck with a dull-as-dishwater job at the library. And she’ll spend all of her free time studying for the SATs or grieving silently with her mother over her father’s recent unexpected death. But everything changes when Macy is corralled into helping out at one of her mother’s open house events, and she meets the chaotic Wish Catering crew. Before long, Macy joins the Wish team. She loves everything about the work and the people. But the best thing about Wish is Wes—artistic, insightful, and understanding Wes—who gets Macy to look at life in a whole new way, and really start living it.
I love fantasy and science fiction books but sometimes I get so wrapped up in them that I forget that there are other types of books out there. The Truth About Forever was a breath of fresh air for me. It took a while for me to get used to the fact that some monster wasn’t going to jump out and attack Macy. Once I got past that I started to really enjoy the book.
Macy was very relatable. I too was that girl who strived to be perfect. I know what it’s like to feel like you’re still not good enough no matter what you do and to be too focused on things. I understood her need to grow and being terrified about how to actually do it. In short, I liked Macy. A lot actually.
If you’ve been reading my reviews for any length of time, you know I’m not fan of romances. I shocked myself by actually enjoying the story between Macy and Wes. collective gasp I guess it was just the fact that it was slow burning and very realistic. It was very natural and didn’t seem forced. Yes, that plot line was very predictable and I knew how things would play out from pretty early on. Despite all that, I enjoyed reading how things played out.
The book is fairly light and fluffy but it deals with some heavy issues fairly well. First and foremost, there’s the issue of grieving. Many of the characters are in various stages of grieving so there are many different aspects of the process represented. I’m sure anyone who has been through the giving process could find a character that represents his/her style. The other issue is very common coming of age storyline. Being put on a break by your significant other is never a fun situation. That aspect of the story isn’t original but it’s still highly enjoyable and easy to relate to. You could definitely see Macy grow as a person and figure things out for herself.
Rating 3.5/5
I’ve missed you, Sarah Dessen. I need more of your books in my life.
The Cheap Reader 
I mostly read science fiction and fantasy too. So honestly, when I pick up a Sarah Dessen book (or similar) everything just seems so normal it kind of freaks me out a bit and I also wonder when a wizard/monster is going to pop out. I’ve become so accustomed to those kinds of books, I sometimes feel “realistic” books are boring now compared to what I normally read.
I loved the romance in “Divergent” so much that I’ve decided to pick up a couple of actual romance books (rather than chick lit where the romance just doesn’t do it for me). Haha! So we’ll see how these go. I scoured lists of “Best Romances” to make sure I was getting some of the best.
Haha, glad I’m not the only one like that. Hope you enjoy your romance books!
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