Reading Group/Who Should Read This Book: This book is a young adult fiction novel. I would say anyone older than 14 can read this book. (The main characters are about 17-years-old)
Rating: I give this book 5 out of 5 stars, I loved it.
Given Summary: When Lucy walks out of a frozen forest, wearing only a silk dress and sandals, she isn’t sure how she got there. But when she sees Colin, she knows for sure that she’s here for him.
Colin has never been captivated by a girl the way he is by Lucy. With each passing day their lives intertwine, and even as Lucy begins to remember more of her life—and her death—neither of them is willing to give up what they have, no matter how impossible it is. And when Colin finds a way to physically be with Lucy, taking himself to the brink of death where his reality and Lucy’s overlap, the joy of being together for those brief stolen moments drowns out everything in the outside world. But some lines weren’t meant to be crossed.
Cover: The cover of this novel depicts Lucy and Colin. This Lucy is the way Colin is able to see her, everyone else sees her with brown hair and green eyes. By the look of their clothes, the cover depicts them being underwater in the lake, wearing the clothes that they wore on the day they first met. They are holding hands, but barely. You can also see that Lucy is pulling Colin towards her with her free had while Colin's free hand covers his heart. She is wide awake and he seems to be unconscious.
Summary: Lucy was brutally murdered ten years ago. Drugged by her headmaster, brought out into the woods, her throat cut, and her heart cut out of her chest. Colin is the only surviver in his family. His sister was hit and killed by a delivery truck and his mom went crazy saying she could see Caroline and drove her family off a bridge, killing herself and her husband, but not Colin. Colin was also the last person who saw Lucy as she was being carried into the woods, if it hadn't been for him her killer never would have been caught. Since then Colin has become somewhat of an adrenaline junkie, spending more time in the infirmary than his dorm room.
When Lucy wakes up in the woods of her school, Saint Osanna's she doesn't know anything about herself. She walks onto the campus and into the Dining Hall. She instantly feels attracted to Colin, like metal to a magnet. They become close and Lucy tells him that she is dead and doesn't exactly know why she's back. Whenever they touch it feels like static, until one day when Colin takes Lucy with him and his best friend jay to go skating on the Lake. Having made a jump out of snow, the boys take turns going off it as Lucy sits on the dock and watches. On one of his jumps, Colin breaks through the ice and into the water. Lucy jumps in to save him and as Jay scrambles to resuscitate him Lucy runs to get help. As she's running, Colin appears behind her perfectly fine. She runs and hugs him and he feels like her, no more static. She quickly realizes that the Colin she's holding isn't the real Colin, he's still laying on the ice in front of Jay. After that, Colin realizes that if he is in the hypothermic state he can be with Lucy for periods of time and they can touch and be together as equals. They do it a few more times, but after the last time, Colin doesn't wake up. He is rushed to the hospital and when he does wake up he promises Dot, his guardian and school chef, that he will not go back to the lake.
Lucy is not the only ghost at Saint Osanna's. Stories had been circulating the school for years. Maggie, the infirmary doctor, grew close to one when she was 19. He came to her when she was doing drugs, made her feel like it was okay for her to be doing the drugs, and disappeared whenever she was clean. Henry is attached to Alex, the way Lucy is attached to Colin. Henry believes they came back from the dead to be Guardians over the people they attach to. Alex had just been diagnosed with Leukemia when Henry came to him.
Lucy sometimes disappears. She doesn't know whys and she doesn't feel the time pass as she's gone. After Colin promised ti never go back to the Lake she disappeared fir almost a month. When she comes back she can't find Colin. She goes back to his dorm, but only Jay is there. He says he's sorry to hear that Alex is dead, lying about being in remission. Lucy freaks out, knowing that Colin must have gone into the Lake to find her. When she gets to the lake she knows it's too late to save him. in the epilogue Colin finds Lucy and the book ends with this sentence: When he saw Lucy, his face relaxed and he blinked once and then twice for her, the second one bringing with it a smile.
My Opinion/Review: This is the first book by Christina Lauren I've read and when I first heard about it I expected it to be very similar to New Moon from the Twilight series. Where a boy and girl are a couple, but one of them has to do adrenaline rushing tasks to see the other. It wasn't and it was amazing. Everyone can see Lucy, if they take the time to notice her. I liked that, it was different from other ghost stories where only one person can see the ghost. It also makes it somewhat relatable. Someone's there if you take the time to notice. I think everyone has a had moment where they feel invisible, but I also think there have been times where we think we're the only person who notices something extraordinary.
I loved how this story was written, it's just real, I don't really know what that means. I hate when authors try to write about teenagers, but they write as if they're living in their teenage years and not current teenage years. These authors definitely don't do that.
The ending of this story is one of those endings where it's happy, but it's not. They end up together and Colin is happy, but he's dead. He left his friends and future behind to be with a ghost he's known for a few months. I liked it, but it's almost like you give a nervous laugh and question how you're supposed to respond.
Christina Lauren typically write adult novels, this is their first young adult novel, and I have read chapters of their other books. They is quite a bit of "romance" ;) in their other novels. This novel is definitely a love story, but it's not so graphic. It's like they had to PG themselves while writing. They did a very good job of it, hinting at curse words and sex, without actually having to write it out (except for a few curse words). I will definitely be reading Christina Lauren's other novels.
Favorite Part: I loved this whole book, and I'm not sure I have one or two favorite parts, because there wasn't a part I didn't like. However, when they go to the dance it is really sweet. It's Colin and Lucy's only official date and she is just so happy and alive during the entire time. It was nice to see her acting the way a 17-year-old should act.
Quotes: In the last chapter of the novel Lucy thinks, "I'm no Guardian; I'm a lure." I liked this quote because it makes you stop and think that maybe she's not so good. However, it's also too late, for you and Colin. It's on the last page before the epilogue and Colin has already drowned in the lake.
Have any of you read Sublime? What did you think of it? What was your favorite part?
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