Review : My Life After Now by Jessica Verdi

Summary (from Goodreads)

Title : My Life After Now
Author : Jessica Verdi
Publication Date : April 2nd 2013
Publisher : Sourcebooks
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Lucy just had the worst week ever. Seriously, mega bad. And suddenly, it's all too much—she wants out. Out of her house, out of her head, out of her life. She wants to be a whole new Lucy. So she does something the old Lucy would never dream of.

And now her life will never be the same. Now, how will she be able to have a boyfriend? What will she tell her friends? How will she face her family?

Now her life is completely different...every moment is a gift. Because now she might not have many moments left.

Personal Thoughts

HIV is  a topic that  hasn't been tackled in YA Contemporary yet, so when I found out that My Life After Now told the story of a teenager who contracts the virus after a one-night stand, I knew I had to read it. I will admit that I did go into the book with trepidation because books about diseases have to be tackled well for me to become invested in the plot line.

Lucy's character was fairly well-developed. Because we also get to know her a little before her one-night stand, we get to see the transition in her character as the fact that she truly has HIV starts to latch onto her mind at all times. This transition was what made Lucy complex character and it proved what a remarkable author Jessica Verdi is. Lucy, as expected, has a tough time dealing with her HIV. In addition, she kept it to herself because she had a nagging doubt that people would hate her if she let her secret out. She had a lot of questions going around in her head, but not being able to express her feelings and letting out the fact that she had HIV slowly started to take a toll on her. Over the course of the book, we do see Lucy beginning to accept her disease and slowly opening up to her loved ones, but the road to that stage wasn't the easiest. I personally think Jessica Verdi did a great job at portraying an HIV positive character in an authentic manner.

More than anything, I really liked how this book provided knowledge after knowledge on HIV and AIDS. It was a brilliant source of information and it provided so much insight onto the disease and the state of mind of HIV patients. The impact that HIV has on social life, the physical aspects of a relationship and one's career/dreams was all beautifully depicted in My Life After Now. We also get to watch how Lucy's disease affected her family and friends. Lucy was actually a lucky girl because she had two supportive dads and two best friends that everyone should have because not all HIV patients have that in their lives because of how ostracized the disease is in society. I loved the role the secondary characters played in this book and how they slowly helped Lucy accept the disease and continue to live her life with their love surrounding her.

Despite all the positives I've mentioned about this book, I did have one issue with it. My Life After Now failed to have an emotional impact on me. I wanted to feel all of Lucy's feelings. I wanted to "go through" her dilemma. I wanted to be able to cry when she was crying. But all that never happened. I think the problem was the fact that the book was too short for it to have that blow that I wanted it to have on me. Regardless of that, My Life After Now was well-written and I applaud Jessica Verdi for having the guts to write a book about this topic with sensitivity.

My Life After Now was a highly educational book that I think adults and young adults alike should read. It definitely taught me a thing or two.

Rating

Cover : 4/5
Plot : 3/5
Characters : 3/5
Writing : 3/5

**Actual Rating : 3.5/5**