I picked up this book at Costco because the cover caught my eye. I am a girl and prety things impress me and the cover of this book is very cool. After I read the back cover, I was so interested in the book that I actually wrote down the title and came home and bought it in the Nook version. The story is about the events before, during, and after a 40th High School reunion. This year marks the 20th reunion for my high school class and perhaps that is what initially drew me to the story. In fact, as I was reading, I kept picturing people my age, not people who were 58 years old. But, even if this is not a reunion year for you, this book very well could be a good book for you to read. I think anyone who graduated from high school would identify with this story. You know what? I bet anyone who went to high school for any length of time would identify with this book because everyone from high school plays a part in the story somehow: the nerdy boy, the nerdy girl, the ones who were on the edge but who were never quite part of the popular group, the cheerleader, and the golden boy. It's no big surprise, the kids who turned out best--good, steady job, kind to others--were the nerdy kids in school. The cheerleader isn't satisfied with her life, neither is the golden boy, and they all return to their reunion to straighen things out and to look for second chances.
It mades me wonder what might happen at my reunion this year. I will not be attending. I will be at Walt Disney World sweating in the August heat. But, I wonder...will there be people there who are hoping to start a relationship that they always dreamed of, but could never quite get? Are there people there who are there only to prove that they made something of themselves? And, are there people there who just want to find one person who is worse off than they are? I bet there will be. I hope that there's not a death table, like in the book. A table with a bouquet of flowers tied with a black ribbon in honor of those classmates who have died. That part made me cry. I am not sure that I could walk past a table like that and still have fun for the rest of the evening. Honestly, I would love to see a handful of classmates and would love to sit and have a conversation--a real conversation--with them like we used to 20 years ago. A conversation that isn't filled with what our kids are doing and how proud of them we are, but a conversation about what we think about our lives and how they turned out. These are the people we dreamed with. It seems only fitting that these are the people with whom we could analyze our lives to see how well we did. I just don't think we are brave enough to do it.
This book begs the question--are you happy with your life and how it turned out? Do you have regrets? It certainly makes you think. Well, it made me think. But then again, this is what I do when I read. I rarely can read a book without relating it to my life in some way. This one was no different.
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