Lisakay125’s Blog

How I live Now by Meg Rosoff May 9, 2009

How I Live Now/Meg Rosoff New York : Wendy Lamb Books, c2004; 194p

ISBN:

 0385746776 (trade)

038590908X (library binding)

055337605 

Review:

5Q * 4P * J * S

Daisy, the narrator of the story, is 15 years old when she is sent to live with her cousins, Piper, Edmond, Isaac, and Osbert in England. Daisy and her cousins ends up having to take care of themselves as Daisy’s Aunt leaves on a mission of peace to Oslo for a peace summit. England is attacked and occupied by an unknown enemy while Daisy and her cousins live day to day in their own “magical” world without adults. All is perfect, except, Daisy and Edmond fall in love despite being cousins.

Then the war intrudes on the cousins and they are separated from one another. Daisy and Piper is sent away to live in a distant village while the boys are kept near their home. Daisy and Piper are determined to be reunited with their family but they soon learn the realities of war as they try to survive on their journey back home and to Edmond and Isaac. The intrusion of the war, the need for Survival, and the responsibility for caring for Piper helps Daisy to grow from a self-centered disgruntled teen to a more mature person. Daisy begins to cope with her Anorexia and other problems when simple survival becomes more important than refusing to eat while others are starving.

The style of the story is wonderful. The first part of the book is written in a unique way that make the reader feel as if Daisy is telling the story while sitting in the same room with the reader. Later, the style changes to a more traditional style of the written word with quotes. This change between the spoken and written word provides the reader with the sense of time passing and Daisy growing up between the two parts of the book.

The book is wonderful, funny, romatic , and tragic at the same time.  It keeps readers at the edge of their seats wanting to know what happens next. I simply couldn’t put the book down. I wanted to know if Daisy and Piper were going to find their cousins and what was going to happen to Daisy’s and Edmond’s love after the war ended.  The narrative conversational writing style of the book was very powerful and made the story seem real.  However, the lack of details about the unknown enemy left a great deal of questions.  I kept wondering how the war started, who started it, and who was the enemy.  It seems that the war’s purpose in the story was to set the scene for the story of Daisy’s and Edmond’s romance and for the changes that occured in Daisy during her journey with Piper back to the farm. 

This story will appeal to teens between 13-17 years old. However, the cover needs some work. The cover is boring and doesn’t grab your attention. The cover may not excite a teenager; however, the story is just the type of story that many teens would love. It has all of the themes, love, war, suspense, survival, and loss that teens love to read about.