Book Review: If He Had Been With Me by Laura Nowlin



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     This book was recommended to me through Twitter- I was told it was just as emotionally damaging as The Fault In Our Stars by John Green. Call me masochistic, but those are my favorite kinds of books- the ones that pull me into the story so much that I cry my eyes out when tragedy strikes. To me, the book is not good enough unless I cry during the sad moments. Sometimes there is an exception, but this rule stands true for most of my reads. So I went to the bookstore the next day and bought this book, then after finishing my stack, I started If He Had Been With Me, ready for tears that never came.

     Autumn is a misfit. She wears a tiara to school everyday, her jeans are ripped, and she is far from popular. Finny lives next door. They used to be best friends, but in middle school they drifted apart and now they hardly speak. Autumn misses having him around all the time, but they're at such opposite ends of the spectrum, that it would be considered wrong for her to associate with him. She has a boyfriend, Jamie, and he's just as much of an outcast as her. Actually, their whole group of friends are misfits- and they're okay with that. One day, Finny is driving in the rain, arguing with his girlfriend, and they crash. The girlfriend makes it out unscathed, but Finny doesn't survive. This is the story of Before- of what happened leading up to that night- told by Autumn.

     I didn't care too much for this book. It was contemporary romance, and everything was high school and teenage drama and relationships and sex and bad choices. I was tempted to abandon it more than a few times, but I didn't, only because I liked Finny's character. Not once did I cry, but like I said, it doesn't always happen that I do, but I just couldn't get into this story. It wasn't my normal read, but I thought I'd give it a shot, and I wasn't really a fan. That's not to say that you wouldn't like it, as the person who recommended it to me was into it, but it just didn't snatch my attention. I give it a 1 1/2 of 5 stars, and I recommend it to those who like contemporary romance revolving around high school drama. It's nothing personal to the story, I just don't play into drama and things like that- I'm not big into everyone's personal problems.