Book Review: "Someday" by David Levithan

Every single day A becomes another person. The person's gender may change, their race may change, their age may fluctuate. Each day A has to navigate that person's life and try not to do any damage, simply stay the course so that no one around them notices anything different. It's a hard way to live, and A is lonely, longing to make a connection and feel the love that so many of the bodies they reside in get to feel.

One day, A met Rhiannon and felt that connection. But once you feel that, how can you give that away, even if that's the rule your life has always followed. After taking over the body of Nathan for one day, A had the chance to spend more time with Rhiannon, finally telling her the truth of why they can't be together. But that one day changes them irrevocably, and leaves them longing for more, for forever.

"What kind of rational person would ever believe the truth? Who wouldn't laugh when someone tells them it's possible to move from one body to another? That's how I reacted at first. The only reason I stopped being rational was because something irrational happened to me. And I knew it."

As A and Rhiannon try to find each other again, Rhiannon also has to decide whether disrupting her life and the lives of those around her is an adequate price to pursue a relationship which might never be able to fulfill. And as she explains to Nathan how the two of them are connected, she realizes there is so much more at stake. But how can she pass up that chance?

A always wondered whether they were the only one who has their kind of life, but it turns out they're not alone. Yet not all of those like A are resigned to living their lives the same way—at least one acts nefariously, causing wreck and ruin in the lives of those they inhabit.

"To love and be loved is to leave traces of permanence across an otherwise careless world."

In Someday, the third book in David Levithan's series of books featuring A, Levithan raises more existential and fundamental questions about life, love, connection, and the effects people have on our lives, sometimes without even realizing it. If you've read the other books in this series—Every Day (see my review) and Another Day (see my review)—you know you have to seriously suspend your disbelief to appreciate this story and feel the emotions the series piques.

Levithan is one of my favorite YA authors out there—he's written some of my all-time favorite books—and I love the way he tells a story. Yet while I absolutely loved the first two books in the series, this third book really left me wanting. Perhaps it was the multiple perspectives through which the story is narrated, perhaps it is the juxtaposition of what motivates A's character versus what motivates the character X, or perhaps it tries too hard to be more philosophical than the first two books. I guess this happens in many multi-book series, but I still was a bit disappointed.

If the concept of these books appeals to you, and you can suspend your disbelief, I'd highly recommend you read the first two books in the series. It's probably best you read them in order, because this book doesn't make as much sense without knowing what happened in the first two.

Even though I didn't like this book as much, I still love the concept, and I can't wait to see what Levithan comes up with next. It's definitely a refreshing spin on the angst-ridden issues we often see in YA novels.