When We Collided Review

Distiller: Hikari Loftus
4/5 Stars



When We Collided
by Emery Lord
352 pages
Bloomsbury USA Childrens (April 5, 2016)

When Vivi moves to Verona Cove for the summer, she’s trying to escape her old life. When Jonah meets Vivi, he’s just trying to survive his.

Jonah is stable, responsible and a whiz in the kitchen. Vivi is unpredictable, full of energy, and working her hardest to make every moment in her life count. Both know what it’s like to have darkness in their lives.

When these two meet, the find that maybe clinging to each other, they can keep each other afloat.

Sorry guys, that’s the best I could do on my own synopsis and avoid spoilers.

We read this book from Jonah and Vivi’s perspectives in alternating chapters. Jonah’s struggles are clear, Vivi’s remain a mystery for much of the book.

I love Jonah SO much. Not only does my foodie heart sing with all the food that is described with Jonah’s chef skills and his family’s restaurant, but he’s just so good. Jonah is amazing.

Vivi is a little more unpredictable. She’s bouncy and bubbly and appears to be what Jonah needs. I both loved her very much and hated her very much at different points in this book.

It’s near the end, when all the secrets are out in the open, did I appreciate the way this book was written. Reading each voice, becoming familiar with them, and then watching them change over the course of the book was fascinating and a revelation.

There are few books that I think handle depression and other such topics really well, and I am not sure if this one was one of them. But I do think it offers a unique way to view those kinds of sicknesses and how they affect people, and I do like the way Vivi and Jonah discuss “darkness”.

This is a love story first. Second, I think it’s a good entry way into finding out and understanding different kinds of mental sickness. It definitely had me online looking up the meaning and symptoms of various topics.

This is a very quick read, and I really needed a YA romance to pick me up after so many adult contemporaries lately. This did just the trick and I loved it.