Alice Yi-Li Yeh

Fitting with my own tastes, this is a character driven story. From the first page the main characters are introduced and distinct personality traits established. Despite emotional ups and downs, the characters remain true to their original architecture and remain strong throughout the entire story. Although other reviewers did not appreciate the use of similes and metaphors, I thought they were well-done for several reasons. First, they were not cliche. Each was an original comparison created by the mind of the character and symbolized how he/she viewed their surroundings. Secondly, although not a text book ‘stream of consciousness’ story, the use of similes and metaphors gave the feeling of flowing thoughts and internal conflict, which was vital to the story and necessary to push the plot along. In my opinion, such writing tools are more important in character driven stories than perhaps, plot driven — but this is an argument for another time. This story examines the emotional rather than the external, and if you enjoy this in your reading choice, then you will like “Someday.”

I try not to comment too often on choice of book title. However, I think this particular work would benefit from a stronger, and less ambiguous title. It doesn’t provide nearly enough insight and I’m afraid will not draw the audience it rightly deserves. The only hitch I had in the general story was when I learned the main character was a white, blonde female. Given the cultural and family conflicts presented from the first chapter forward, I automatically imagined a girl of Asian descent. It threw me for a loop when this was revealed not to be the case and it took sometime for me to accept the imagery. I call it a cultural imprint or hiccup. Was it devastating to the story line? No, but it did make me question the believability of the story (even fiction), because after all, a fiction writer’s job is to ‘sell’ the story.… (mehr)