Through to You by Emily Hainsworth

Release Date: Out now!

Publisher: Simon & Schuster

Pages: 272pgs

The Story

Camden Pike has been grief-stricken since his girlfriend, Viv, died. Viv was the last good thing in his life: helping him rebuild his identity after a career-ending football injury, picking up the pieces when his home life shattered, and healing his pain long after the meds wore off. And now, he’d give anything for one more glimpse of her. But when Cam makes a visit to the site of Viv’s deadly car accident, he sees some kind of apparition. And it isn’t Viv.

The apparition’s name is Nina, and she’s not a ghost. She’s a girl from a parallel world, and in this world, Viv is still alive. Cam can’t believe his wildest dreams have come true. All he can focus on is getting his girlfriend back, no matter the cost. But things are different in this other world: Viv and Cam have both made very different choices, things between them have changed in unexpected ways, and Viv isn’t the same girl he remembers. Nina is keeping some dangerous secrets, too, and the window between the worlds is shrinking every day. As Cam comes to terms with who this Viv has become and the part Nina played in his parallel story, he’s forced to choose—stay with Viv or let her go—before the window closes between them once and for all.

The Review

THROUGH TO YOU is, perhaps at times, a little too predictable for my taste. Especially the ending. But in that case, it still didn't stop me in liking the actual book itself. Not by any means. I really enjoyed it. It was quite addictive, crazy, fun, and in the end, I thought it sent a beautiful message about starting over and getting over your own grief to try and move forward with your own life.

Our main protagonist, Camden, starts off as a pretty unlikable guy in the beginning (you want to throw something at him to see if he reacts to it) as he's dealing with the loss and the recent death of his girlfriend (sorry dude). Now I quite liked Camden. He had that typical - and real - boy feel about him and I could completely sympathize with him in what he was currently going through, and how he's stuck in the past with no way out. You can completely understand why he is the way he is. But he made me feel really depressed. Death after all doesn't make anyone feel happy in any sense. Still, Camden may have made choices I didn't agree with, was a bit naive over things and he didn't question nor think about the consequences of his own choices, but I still liked him as a main character and that's the main thing, right? Though he does make a great turnaround at the end and I respect him for it.

But what made this book shine was the instant moment when Camden crosses paths with a strange girl named Nina, whom he hasn't met before and yet she happens to know his name like they were best friends or something and whom has this 'other life' beyond his own physical world. A parallel universe I suppose and boy you have to know how much I love parallel universes. I'm obsessed with them in fact. Now this is pretty much when things get really, really interesting after meeting this Nina. And that's Nina for you. She just always had that amazing way of hooking you into the book!

Now Nina for me, this strange, wonderful and absolutely quirky girl character, was SOOOOO loved by me and if it wasn't for her character I don't think I would've liked this book as much as I did. Ah, I just loved her! She was so honest and so upfront with pretty much everything that was going on and I kind of wished Camden respected her more than believed the lies of others about her character. He just wasn't so nice to her in my opinion. But time will tell whether he'll finally realize just how great Nina is. But Nina . . . gosh my heart really felt for the poor girl. Not like the 'other' Vivian, Camden's sort of dead girlfriend who isn't really his girlfriend, who was just . . . argh *tries to slap her*. Vivian was such a terrible character. I was all for Nina and Camden I tell you!

But as for how everything ended in the book, I knew it was going to end in the way it did. I mean, I definitely saw it coming a mile away before reaching the end, but it still didn't mean that I would like for it to actually happen in that way, you know? Of course I understand why it ended in the way it did as it has this cosmic karma thing going on and it was kind of sweet leaving you going, 'Yeah, that was a nice ending . . . so open ended and lovely', but being the hopeless romantic that I am when it comes to my books (not in real life mind you) I was hoping for . . . so much more. Still, I liked it well enough.

Overall, both emotionally-charged and a completely engrossing read, with a slight cross-over between Sliding Doors and a lesser sci-fi world of Fringe, I thought THROUGH TO YOU was a lovely debut and I'm looking forward to reading more books from Emily Hainsworth. She definitely has great potential that author after what I've just read!

The Rating

4/5 stars