Review: I Heart You, You Haunt Me

Title I Heart You, You Haunt Me
By Lisa Schroder
Genre YA Contemporary Verse
Rating ⭐️⭐️

Synopsis
Ava and Jackson were inseparable or so they thought. When Jackson dies in a horrible accident Ava must learn to live with out him. But when she starts seeing his ghost and hearing his voice in her head she thinks maybe she doesn't have to lose him after all.

First Sentence
I've never been to a funeral until today.





I love verse novels. There's something so great about such a short story with so few words that can rip your heart out and then put it back together. I'm always shocked that I love them so much, particularly because I don't like short stories. Is there really a difference? But I digress.

This one was sadly a disappointment. It was a fine story about grieving and then moving onward in life but it felt more like a short story. Aw! See?! Maybe I wasn't digressing. Short stories don't have enough depth. Somehow, verse novels have loads of depth. This one, sadly was just too..1+1 =2. If that makes sense,

On the bright side I read it quickly and can tick off another book for my Goodreads Challenge. I'm so behind!

Should you read it?
Meh, nothing special here. You wouldn't miss anything by skipping it.

Review: Elevated

Title Elevated
By Elana Johnson
Genre YA Contemporary Verse
Pages 300

First Sentence April rain sinks in sheets, forces me to squint against the chaos in the sky, makes the WALK signal blurry, almost invisible.



Synopsis
The last person Elly wants to get trapped in an elevator with is her ex Travis. She hasn't told him why she broke up with him or why she hasn't talked to him for five months. But her secrets are about to come out. When you have nowhere to go, you can't hide from the truth.



What it has going for it
Let me just start off telling you two very important things about this book. One, the cover and synopsis make it look just adorable and fluffy. It's not. Two, I hated this book the whole way through until the end...and then I loved it. With that out of the way let me tell you a little about why I loved it without spoiling too much. This book, though it looks light and fluffy, is anything but. There's not one single piece of fluff in this one. It's sad and depressing and seemingly hopeless...seemingly. It has that beautiful writing a verse novel has and Elana pulls out all the guns on the feelings department. In the end, if you can make it through the poor decisions and MC's guilt trips, you'll find a beautiful and important message. A message so important that the whole sad story made it worth it.

What's lacking
It's very hard to read this one and agree with the choices being made and to see the things these poor characters have to deal with. It's gritty and real and painful. I really didn't like Travis. I'm sorry but he was just so broken and there was no fixing him. The ending made it worth it, though.

Yea or Nay?
Yes, I'd highly recommend it. It's a verse novel, as I mentioned and so a fast read. It's also too real and beautiful to miss.