If I Stay (Book #1)by Gayle Forman

Mia has no memory of the accident that changed her life. This inexperienced 17-year-old only recalls riding on that slippery Oregon road with her family, then, in an instant, seeing herself lifted from the twisted wreck. This affecting story of one young woman's struggle through tragedy and grieving will appeal to readers of books like Thirteen Reasons Why. (goodreads.com)

I have to get this little niggly thing out of the way first - that last line in the summary on Goodreads? I don't get it. I read Thirteen Reasons Why this summer and it is NOTHING like If I Stay. Yes, I enjoyed both books but I don't see a connection there. Anyhow that's the summary I got from Goodreads, and I wasn't going to leave that last sentence in because it bothered me so much but I did anyways because I wanted to ramble about it. :PAnd now for some back story as to why this book was difficult for me. When I was 18 my best friend who was 17 and her mother were killed in a car accident when a MAC truck hit them. It was October. It was rainy and cold. My mother and her mother had grown up together. My friend and I grew up together. We always said our kids would grow up together. The mother died instantly I was told. My friend passed 24 hours later after falling into a coma. She was 17. Mia is 17. Mia "survived" the crash unlike her family and my friend's mother.I know this is fiction but it was so close to home with the age and the accident and the coma and brain swelling. It was hard. It made me wonder if my friend had been outside of her body watching everything going on. If she was scared, alone, tired, in pain. Did she know I was writing a song for her as she finally passed away. Almost at the exact same time they called it and I signed and dated my song.Whereas I didn't connect as much with Mia as I did with Sam in Before I Fall, the story was closer to my own reality than Lauren Oliver's novel was. I don't know why I suddenly seem to be on such a morbid story line kick, I swear it's not on purpose! Before I Fall made me wonder what might happen to people when they die - do they really get a chance to relive their last day and make changes? If I Stay made me think of my best friend, taken from the world at such a young age and stuck in limbo for 24 hours after the accident. Could she hear people? Did she know what was going on? What does happen to brain dead or comatose people? What do they hear? Feel? Anything? All I could picture was my friend, who looked nothing like the way Mia was described. The story was nothing like my real life but the situation was so real to me.Even now, 5 hours after I finished the novel I am thinking of my friend and realizing how much emotion the novel has brought up in me without even realizing it. I suddenly achingly miss my grandparents who passed in 2008 and 2009, my aunt who passed in 2007 as well as my friend and her mother who passed in 1994.All of this and yet I still feel that this book doesn't need to have a sequel. I am not entirely certain why a sequel was decided. I think if you added another 50 pages to the story it would have been enough to resolve it. I don't even know if I want to read the sequel. I am happy not knowing what happens. Somehow it makes it more realistic and poignant. Maybe it's just to raw for me and I can't continue to wander down the path with Mia as she makes her decision. I don't think I would be at all happy with either decision if I think about it. I like the not knowing. It feels more like real life.At the same time I want to read more by the author. I like her writing. I remember also liking her talking while at the Teen Author Carnival in NYC in May. This was one of the only books I bought while there and I stood in line to get it signed. I was very happy to meet her, having not really known much about her or the book before I went to TAC. Something about the author made me curious about the book and then the book made me like the author even more. Happy circle!I think maybe I need to read something happier now because I feel like I am drowning in a puddle of tears with all these books about death! *sniff*