Forever
by Maggie Stiefvater
ISBN-13: 9780545259088
ISBN-10: 0545259088
Publisher: Scholastic Press
Date: July 2011
Page Count: 400
Reading Level: Ages 14-17
Advance copy received from Scholastic Press for honest review.
Synopsis: The thrilling conclusion to #1 bestselling Shiver trilogy from Maggie Stievater
In Maggie Stiefvater’s SHIVER, Grace and Sam found each other. In LINGER, they fought to be together. Now, in FOREVER, the stakes are even higher than before. Wolves are being hunted. Lives are being threatened. And love is harder and harder to hold on to as death comes closing in.
5/5 stars
FOREVER actually came to me in the mail as a complete surprised. Yes, I screamed when I opened it. Yes, I took a picture and sent to my friends who would be completely envious of me. Yes, I tweeted and updated my Facebook page. Duh, who wouldn’t?? I had completely forgotten that back in October I had emailed Amanda F. Vega over at Scholastic Trade Book Publishing to request this ARC and she graciously told me she’d put me down on the list. I was excited back then but then forgot all about it. So let me just say, Thank you Amanda, thank you so much for keeping your promise. Reading Forever was bitter-sweet. You want to know the conclusion and have the reassurance that everything is going to be right in the world before it’s over but at the same time, you don’t want the story to end. At least I didn’t. Maggie Stiefvater has an amazing gift. I think her writing is so fluid and beautiful. The way she can write the simplest of phrases is stunning. Many times I found myself reread a line over and over again in awe of the beauty of it. I see her writing like a contemporary dance routine. It’s beautifully crafted, whimsical, and lyrical; able to convey a variety of emotion from a beautiful song or melody. When I thought of this analogy, I immediately thought of this dance routine that I saw on “So You Think You Can Dance” television show that I love to watch. I think about how bad Sam wants Grace and how much he wishes he could fix her. And the wanting…there is so much wanting. Just reading the words on the page, I could feel the ache of wanting pulling at me. The clip, if you want to see what I’m referring to is HERE I think it shows Sam and Grace so well…to me. Please watch it. The story, as in Linger, is in Sam, Grace, Isabel and Cole’s points of view. I loved reading the story this way. Maggie gives us just enough from each person to keep you turning that page to see what will happen to who next. I can’t speak to the plot of this story much because I don’t want to spoil a single moment for you. Twenty pages in and I already felt like I wanted to cry with the beauty of it all. I can’t say enough how fantastic the writing is. But I have to mention how incredibly sweet Sam still is and he is completely perfect in every way. The love and need he has for Grace in unmeasurable. Cole on the other hand became a fast favorite when he appeared in Linger and I can’t say enough on how much I loved him in Forever. He became alive and driven and I enjoyed every minute seeing the change in him from where he once started out in Linger. It is truly refreshing to have a book with two main male leads that you love so much because they are after two separate girls. It’s something I don’t think we see much of in the books we have today. Everyone wants to know how it ends. Well you’ll have to read that to see for your self. I actually thought I was going to make it through this book without crying since Shiver and Linger proved impossible for me to restrain my tears. I thought I was home free, no tears. ten or so chapters from the end and the bottom fell out. I was sobbing, trying so hard not to get tears and snot on my sweet little advanced readers copy; to keep it in the perfect condition it arrived in. All the while, asking myself, “WHY?! How Maggie?? How can you be so cruel to me?!! Then the end came and I flipped back to the last page and read it again and then one more time for good measure because that was it. I closed the book, ending the final chapter of The Wolves of Mercy Falls. And finally, I dried my eyes and I could breath again. Simply saying, “I loved this book,” is not efficient enough!! Maggie has crafted a fantastic series with The Wolves of Mercy Falls and you’d be crazy not to get your hands on these amazing books. You will be hooked to the very last page.I look forward to reading Maggie’s upcoming stand-alone novel, The Scorpio Races. Coming in October18, 2011.