Review | Another Day by David Levithan

This book is a companion novel to Every Day by David Levithan, and I highly suggest you reading Every Day before diving into Another Day to get the full impact of the story. I would recommend you refrain from reading this until you do because it contains spoilers to the first book.

Goodreads Summary:

The eagerly anticipated companion to David Levithan’s New York Times bestseller Every Day

In this enthralling companion to his New York Times bestseller Every Day, David Levithan (co-author of Will Grayson, Will Grayson with John Green) tells Rhiannon’s side of the story as she seeks to discover the truth about love and how it can change you.

Every day is the same for Rhiannon. She has accepted her life, convinced herself that she deserves her distant, temperamental boyfriend, Justin, even established guidelines by which to live: Don’t be too needy. Avoid upsetting him. Never get your hopes up.

Until the morning everything changes. Justin seems to see her, to want to be with her for the first time, and they share a perfect day—a perfect day Justin doesn’t remember the next morning. Confused, depressed, and desperate for another day as great as that one, Rhiannon starts questioning everything. Then, one day, a stranger tells her that the Justin she spent that day with, the one who made her feel like a real person . . . wasn’t Justin at all.

I received this ARC from Netgalley in exchange for an honest, non-biased review.

The whole novel is written in Rhiannon’s point of view, a girl whose boyfriend acted differently for a day and she then figures out that it wasn’t actually her boyfriend acting, it was A, a soul of a person who takes over bodies and wakes up in a different one everyday.

One thing I love about David Levithan is the diversity he incorporates into his books. The incredible writing is one thing, but the idea behind making a contemporary book so memorable is amazing. This is probably why I gave this book such a high rating. I couldn’t say I didn’t enjoy it, I did, but just because it’s a great story and it’s David Levithan.

In this book, you get to experience the whole thing from Rhiannon’s point of view, starting with figuring out what A is and how she takes it when everything is broken down to her. You get to see how confused she is about her relationship and how all of this affects her emotionally. I went into this one thinking it was a sequel and not knowing what this it is the same story from Rhiannon’s POV, I was greatly disappointed because I would have loved a sequel since I fell in love with the first book. I didn’t mind it-even though I never ever read those, but I continued on reading, then I was kind of disappointed again.

Rhiannon wasn’t my favourite character in the first book, but seeing things from her POV was kind of annoying and it made me dislike the character even more. The way she kept making excuses for Justin’s terrible actions and how weak she was when it came to him is a huge NO. I cannot stand verbal nor physical abuse and the verbal abuse was crystal clear, Justin couldn’t lay hands on her, but his words cut like knives. I felt bad for Rhiannon and I was rooting for her to end it all along and when she finally did I was relieved.

Justin is a huge A--HOLE. I couldn’t justify his actions what-so-ever. I’m glad I got to see his background and his reasoning behind his whip of a tongue, but I couldn’t agree to what he was doing. He constantly insulted Rhiannon and their relationship wasn’t healthy AT ALL. Seeing it from Rhiannon’s POV made me hate him even more than I originally did. He didn’t care what she thought, didn’t care for her nor her feelings, he didn’t even think twice before he acted out on her and used her as a verbal punch bag. He always lashed out on her and directed his anger towards her and she never once stood up to defend herself or even stand in the way of her shattered dignity. When she finally broke free (he actually broke up with her), he called her a whore and ruined her reputation and for what? A simple hug. This just added to him being a jerk and how terrible of a person he is.

We got to experience more characters in this, we were introduced to Rhiannon’s friends and saw their true colours. They are helpful and had her back the whole time, they supported her through thick and thin and I appreciated that a lot.

I loved how Rhiannon loved A unconditionally, she loved him/her for his/her soul and nothing else. She was confused as to the gender of A and how she would wholly love him, but I get it. I felt her confusion and reaction as a reader and we didn’t get to see that side of her in Every Day.

One thing I’m confused about is the ending, if anyone read this or the other book, can you tell me what you fathomed from it? I’m not a hundred percent certain.