Gimme a Call
Gimme a Callby Sarah Mlynowski
Devi's life isn't turning out at all like she wanted. She wasted the past three years going out with Bryan—cute, adorable, break-your-heart Bryan. Devi let her friendships fade, blew off studying, didn't join any clubs . . . and now that Bryan has broken up with her, she has nothing left.Not even her stupid cell phone—she dropped it in the mall fountain. Now it only calls one number . . . hers. At age fourteen, three years ago!Once Devi gets over the shock—and convinces her younger self that she isn't some wacko—she realizes that she's been given an awesome gift. She can tell herself all the right things to do . . . because she's already done all the wrong ones! Who better to take advice from than your future self?Except . . .what if getting what you think you want changes everything? (goodreads.com)
I feel sort of bad only getting to this book now - almost exactly a year after I got it. BEA last year was fun and all, but what I REALLY loved was the Teen Author Carnival that was held on the Monday night. It's being held again this year, Monday May 23. If you're going to be in NYC for BEA as of the Monday evening I HIGHLY recommend you going. Last year there were 3 panels of awesome authors and they rotated so you could catch each one if you wanted to. I did and I met some great people. (And I missed meeting some great people like, Reagan from Miss Remmers's Review because I didn't know she was there until the next day and yet she was sitting in front me me almost the entire time. GAH!)One of the authors on the panels last year was Sarah Mlynowski. Turns out she's also a Montreal area girl and we chatted it up for a little while at the end of the evening. They were selling copies of the authors' books at the TAC but since it was my first night there and seeing as how I had limited US funds so I wasn't able to buy many books. I was lucky enough that Sarah had one copy of her book with her and she signed it for me!! I had every intention of reading Gimme a Call as soon as I got home from my trip last year, but because my eyes were having such a difficult time healing from the LASIK that February, my reading was seriously hampered.So I finally picked it up this May long weekend. I can't get to NYC this year for various reasons, so I thought, why not try and finish off the books that I got LAST year during this week. (I know, it's awful! There are books I picked up that I still have not read!)I have to say that Gimme a Call is a perfect spring/summer/nice sunny day read! It didn't take me long to read and it was light and cheerful and fun! I was a little surprised because I thought that the older Devi would have been older than just Senior year. Either way, Senior Devi speaking with Freshman Devi worked for me. I loved the idea that with each little thing Older Devi's life changes in a magical instant. I loved how there were always consequences that neither Devi could predict and then had to go back and change. I was sort of wondering what would happen if future Devi gave past Devi the lotto numbers and it was totally covered in this story.I truly liked the way the story played out. I felt a real connection to each Devi even though they were technically the same person, just 3 years apart. I surprisingly even liked Bryan a LOT. He seemed so sweet and charming from that first meeting and I couldn't see how someone who spent to much time getting to get Devi to go out with him could cheat on her.As Disney Happy ending as the book was, I completely enjoyed every minute of it. I sort of wish this was a Disney movie (only true to the book) because I'd love to see it in "real" life. (reel life? *snicker*)I had no idea that Sarah had written all sorts of other novels! I will certainly be checking them out now because I found her writing thoroughly enjoyable AND she's like my homegirl even if she's living in the US now. ;)