Tuesday 14 June 2011

The Truth About Forever

At the moment I am revising for my second year uni exams, and so have to re-do a lot of 'classic' fiction. But in my relaxing time I'm re-reading my favourite books. This is one of those books.

The Truth About Forever
by
Sarah Dessen 

I read this book for the first time when I was thirteen, borrowing a ratty old paperback edition from my tiny local library. The next day I bought a hard back edition. I've gone on to buy every single Dessen novel on the day of release, right up to her current hit "What Happened to Goodbye" (there will be a review soon).  But  seven years after my first encounter, it is this book to which I constantly return as it still has the same effect, making my laugh, cry and smile.

It's the story of Macy, the girl whose dad died. Except she's slowly learning that that isn't all she has to be, and that maybe it's ok not to be perfect.

I'm not going to critically analyse this book or even give my usual synoptic review. In all honesty I don't think I'd do justice to a book that has meant so much to me. Instead I'm just going to quote the last paragraph, as it sums up perfectly the truth about forever...

Forever was so many different things. It was always changing, it was what everything was really all about. It was twenty minutes, or a hundred years, or just this instant, or any instant I wished would last and last. But there was only one truth about forever that really mattered, and that was this: it was happening. Right then... and every moment afterwards. Look, there. Now. Now. Now.


For the hours of happiness it has given me I can only say thank you to Sarah Dessen, and please, keep on writing.