Mini-Review: Stay

Mini-reviews are where I write about books that I want to mention but am either too lazy or too busy to write a full-length review for. I say what I thought about the book in 5 sentences then share a quote I liked from the book.

Stay, by Deb Caletti. The summary:

Clara's relationship with Christian is intense from the start, and like nothing she’s ever experienced before. But what starts as devotion quickly becomes obsession, and it's almost too late before Clara realizes how far gone Christian is—and what he's willing to do to make her stay.Now Clara has left the city—and Christian—behind. No one back home has any idea where she is, but she still struggles to shake off her fear. She knows Christian won't let her go that easily, and that no matter how far she runs, it may not be far enough....

Mini-review
I love Deb Caletti, but her books can sometimes be a bit hit or miss for me; I’m happy to report, though, that “Stay” was 100 percent hit—I really, truly, and thoroughly enjoyed it, and it’s now probably one of my favorite of Caletti’s books. Clara, the main character, despite having a crazy stalker ex-boyfriend, was totally likeable and easy to relate to, and she made it so painfully clear how someone so normal could end up in such a screwed-up relationship. And her relationship with her dad was straight-up amazing—there’s a plethora of terrible or absent fathers in YA fiction, but Clara’s dad was funny and caring and involved, and I found myself looking forward to the scenes with him in them. Like Caletti’s other books, this one was full of gems of wisdom that had me nodding my head and going, “That’s SO TRUE!”—Caletti has some serious insight into what makes people tick. So overall, a completely awesome book; it maybe dragged a little in the middle, but as soon as things with Finn picked up and the drama with Christian got more intense, I didn’t want to put it down.

The quote, p. 179:

Finn helped the passengers off the boat, lending each his hand. He trotted over to me when he was finished. Every time I saw him it was the same. He was the same. He was his same, easygoing self with his wide smile and shy eyes. He didn’t become other, surprising things. I had realized what a great thing sameness was. You wouldn’t think it, but it was true. There was a shelter in certain rhythms—seasons and tides and boats that went out and came back in, people who were steady, who kept steady hands on the rudders.I guess that’s what safety is.

Sameness you can count on.