This Song Will Save Your Life in The Reader's Lounge

Oct 08, 2012 Jasprit rated it really liked it · review of another edition

Shelves: arc-galley, out-2013, read-in-2013, contemporary, ya

4.5 stars

Leila Sales first impressed me with her wit and charm in Past Perfect; it was a book after a recommendation from two great bloggers (Nomes & Flann) I devoured in a few hours. It had an interesting mix of characters and was a book which had me laughing endlessly. It was a story I absolutely adored. This time once again I fell in love with this beautiful story by Sales but for different reasons entirely.

Sales has a beautiful talent for making a story appear so real. With Past Perfect I w 4.5 stars

Leila Sales first impressed me with her wit and charm in Past Perfect; it was a book after a recommendation from two great bloggers (Nomes & Flann) I devoured in a few hours. It had an interesting mix of characters and was a book which had me laughing endlessly. It was a story I absolutely adored. This time once again I fell in love with this beautiful story by Sales but for different reasons entirely.

Sales has a beautiful talent for making a story appear so real. With Past Perfect I wished that I could attend a history set up, it honestly bought out the inner geek within me. With This Song Will Save Your Life all I wanted to take care of Elise. Elise had experienced a torrid time at school and through no fault of her own. She tried to do as much as she could to fit in, until it all became too much. Elise was an intelligent girl but lacked so much confidence because of the constant taunting she had to deal with. So I’m glad that by accident a chance came her way which allowed her to shine. It did take some time for Elise to finally realise her full potential, there were a lot of hurdles which got in her way, but I’m glad when she needed the support her true friends came through.

It took Elise a while to get comfortable with who she was, she had friends but they weren’t friends just people she hung around with. I did appreciate the people she did come in Elise’s life such as Vicky and Harry and even Char who accepted Elise for who she was and didn’t make instant judgements about her. The kids at school just believed what they were told, but with the people at Start Elise had the chance to actually have her own new fresh start. In This Song Will Save Your Life, it was a huge learning and growing process for Elise, like I said before there were a lot of stumbling blocks along the way, but a lot of them I came to realise were there so that Elise could learn from them.

This Song Will Save Your Life was a fun read, it was such a different book to what I was expecting, it was a raw honest story of a girl that I’m sure many individuals out there could relate to with her situation. Sales once again weaved a story which had me up reading until the early hours. I truly appreciated the heartbreaking story she decided to treat us to. I liked how she showed that despite loads of things getting in the way you should never give up, Elise continued to battle through things and I admired the character which emerged in the end and that she could show so many people out there that anything was possible.

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Jun 22, 2013 Danielle rated it it was amazing · review of another edition

Read more reviews at What Danielle Did Next

This Song Will Save Your Life is one of those books that reminds me just why I love Young Adult so much. Fresh, realistic, thought-provoking, this story reminded me of that loneliness, that feeling of inadequacy that haunts you as a teenager (and let's face it - never goes away). It's not often I call books beautiful but for me, Leila Sales has written one beautiful book. When I get the FEELS at page 21 I know I'm on to a winner.

TSWSYL introduces us t Read more reviews at What Danielle Did Next

This Song Will Save Your Life is one of those books that reminds me just why I love Young Adult so much. Fresh, realistic, thought-provoking, this story reminded me of that loneliness, that feeling of inadequacy that haunts you as a teenager (and let's face it - never goes away). It's not often I call books beautiful but for me, Leila Sales has written one beautiful book. When I get the FEELS at page 21 I know I'm on to a winner.

TSWSYL introduces us to Elise. Elise broke my heart, I know Elise, I've been Elise, I've made fun of Elise, I've stuck up for Elise. Elise is that girl, that beautiful soul you can't help but root for, can't help but wish that everyone else can see just what a magical human being she is. She's special, like everyone else - but because of the rules, the perceptions, the BS, we don't always get the recognition. Someone else decides that we are cool or aren't cool. We're weird because we like The Clash or because we don't like The Clash, we choose converse over heels, we like Gossip Girl instead of Hannibal and vice versa.

Elise says in the book "I didn't know. I feel sometimes like...there are all these rules. Just to be a person. You know? You're supposed to carry a shoulder bag, not a backpack. You're supposed to wear headbands, or you're not supposed to wear headbands. It's okay to describe yourself as likeable, but it's not okay to describe yourself as eloquent. You can sit in the front of the school bus, but you can't sit in the middle. You're not supposed to be with a boy, even when he wants you to. I didn't know that. There are so many rules, and they don't make any sense, and I just can't learn them all" How very true...

Elise doesn't fit in. She tries - desperately - but never seems to quite grasp the social nuances of her school and peers. You can feel her pain in every page. The isolation. It's just heartbreaking. Bullying is not unique to the young but reading about Elise's struggles every day, the effort it takes to ignore it and the effort her bullies go to in order to destroy her days reminded me of that position, that feeling in the pit of the stomach as it happened in my school, to me, to someone I know. That overwhelming feeling of helplessness was beyond upsetting to read.

When Elise literally stumbles across Start "The Greatest Underground Party" and meets Vicky, Pippa and the enigmatic Char, her life changes. For the better? Maybe...

There is so much about this book I loved but the music was so very special. It pulsed through the pages, providing us with the soundtrack to Elise's heartbreak, her recovery, her sadness and her triumph. Every song chosen had it's place, it's part to play, each scene so viscerally real, it gave me chills.

Elise is the star but every girl needs her back up singers and the characters of Vicky, Mel, Char and Elise's dad truly made the book one of my favourites of the year. The charisma, the honesty, the emotion that oozed off the page in Elise's interactions with them really resonated with me. I connected with this book immediately and it held me until the very last oh so beautiful lines.

"You think it's so easy to change yourself. You think it's so easy but it's not. True,things don't stay the same forever: couches are replaced, boys leave, you discover a song, your body becomes forever scarred. And with each of these moments you change and change again, your true self spinning, shifting positions - but always at last it returns to you, like a dancer on the floor. Because through out it all, you are still, always, you: beautiful and bruised, known and unknowable. And isn't that - just - you - enough?"

This Song will Save your Life was a breath of fresh air, a stand-out amongst mediocrity, it may not save your life, but it'll remind you that life is worth saving.
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Sep 13, 2013 Pili rated it it was amazing · review of another edition

This book is the kind of book that I would recommend to everyone and anyone. It's the kind of book that kept me up till I finished it at 4 am and I finished reading on my phone's Kindle app when my tablet run out of battery.

I'm not a big fan of contemporary books, but when the book is as good as this one, feels as real as this one, I completely forget about my reservations about the genre.

Elise is a girl that has never been popular, a girl that has always been different and has always been ostra This book is the kind of book that I would recommend to everyone and anyone. It's the kind of book that kept me up till I finished it at 4 am and I finished reading on my phone's Kindle app when my tablet run out of battery.

I'm not a big fan of contemporary books, but when the book is as good as this one, feels as real as this one, I completely forget about my reservations about the genre.

Elise is a girl that has never been popular, a girl that has always been different and has always been ostracized by her peers. She's tried to be herself and go on through school, middle school to high school but one summer she decides to try and change herself and be popular in the next year of HS. She watches shows, she reads teen magazines... she makes such an effort to try and learn how to fit it, how to change and be like others and not like she is... but it fails and she just doesn't know what else to do. Recovering from her choices that alienate her even more she stumbles upon a world she didn't know it existed and finds herself making friends with some other very interesting characters, Char, Pippa, Vicky...

Elise is a wonderful character, so full of life, so real and so easy to relate with. You might not agree with some of her choices, but you just can't help but totally understand where she is coming from, and understand how she ends up making the choices that she does. She's intelligent, strong, funny and loves music.

It is such a raw book, all the interactions with the characters, the high school setting, it all feels so real, not just the usual cliches, but situations that feel real enough. The relationships between Elise and her peers, Elise and her two familes and Elise and her new friends and her first romance... it all feels real, it all feels relatable and all the characters have depth, flaws and great qualities. All contribute one way or another to Elise journey in this book, her journey to learn who she is, accept who she is, and find a way to be proud of who she is and accept that she can be loved and have friends and not boycott herself with her own doubts.

It is not a fluffy book, it is a tough book to read on occasions, even more if you, like me, connect with Elise and her journey, but it is a book that despite the hard bits will leave with you a smile, and not just a small smile, but the smile that comes from inside and warms you up. It's not just a song that saves a life, music is almost a character in itself in this book, whenever a song was mention I played it in my head if I knew it and if not, I made a not to look for it later in YouTube... There should be a playlist there with all the fantastic music from this book.

A very well deserved 5 stars! ...more

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