Have you ever closed a book and just smiled because you were really happy that you read it? That is what this book was like for me. I thought it was a great coming of age story with a character that was very likeable. I though Lelia was great, she was a very caring young women who wanted to please others, but also looked out for herself. She worked hard at everything she did and was one of those YA characters that I could see myself being friend with.

I loved her relationship with Eamon. Yes, he was significantly older, but he waited until she was 17, insisted that he met her guardians, and made sure that he took things slowly so she knew he was not just after one thing. While her ex-boyfriend thought Lelia was stupid, she really was very mature for her age. I saw a lot of reviews saying the relationship was “icky” or “pedophile”. For one, she is 17. That is the age of consent and pedophilia is being attracted to undeveloped bodies, not 17 year olds. And it was not portrayed as being “icky” at all. He really cared about her and the author portrayed it that way.

It was by no means a perfect book, after the 15th mention of her dyslexia I wanted to yell out that I got it already and while the writing was mostly very good, there were awkwardly worded passages that could have been better. ( )

10/2012 I wanted to revisit this one after my uncle's suicide, and I'm glad I did. There's more depth for me here now, though I didn't get any more answers than Leila did.

5/2006 Clear, quiet and entrancing coming-of-age story. Leila is as real a character as you could wish for, and she inhabits her odd, semi-detached family with a certain prickly ease. We learn here about the ripples cast by Leila's older half-sister's suicide, and what a family can do after a tragedy like this. Just lovely. Beautiful writing, fully realized characters, and instantly recognizable situations. ( )

Reviewed by Jocelyn Pearce for TeensReadToo.com

When Leila's much older sister, Rebecca, kills herself, it changes the lives of everyone who knew her, and many people who didn't. But did anyone really know Rebecca, or just the face she showed them? This is just one of the questions that Leila can't help but ask herself in the months after her sister's death. Did she know Rebecca? Or did she only know Rebecca through her interactions with other people? Leila knows her father. She knew her father's first wife, Janie, who died before Rebecca. But if she had really known Rebecca, if anyone had known Rebecca fully, wouldn't they have been able to figure out Rebecca's reasons for doing what she did?

It's for that reason that Leila is searching when she meets Eamon. At first he's only a customer in the café where she once saw Rebecca with the mysterious T., a man she thinks might know something of the reason Rebecca had for committing suicide. Later, though, he becomes something much more.

Clare is Leila's surviving older half-sister. Clare has her own life: a boyfriend, a career, and an apartment--suddenly one occupant short. Rebecca lived there, and now that Leila's parents are moving to Poland for the year, she will move in with Clare. During this year, Clare and Raphael, their unrelated "cousin," will become much, much more important in Leila's life. She will get to know them, maybe in the way she never got to know Rebecca--the way she is still trying to get to know Rebecca, even after her death.

STAY WITH ME is a very powerful, moving story about love, loss, and life. It's about the way life keeps going on, even after a tragedy. Since it takes place in New York and since Rebecca dies right after the attacks on the city on 9/11, the characters are healing from their own personal tragedy, but also, along with everyone else in the city, from the attack on them all. That's not the focus of the novel, but it's definitely a part of it.

Garrett Freymann-Weyr is brilliant at creating wonderful, three-dimensional characters. I've read two of her previous novels (MY HEARTBEAT and WHEN I WAS OLDER), and that's something that can be seen in all of her work. It's a talent, and I was glad to see it shows just as much in STAY WITH ME as in the other two novels. We learn plenty, even about the characters only glimpsed in the novel. The character I felt I knew the least was Leila's mother, but she was not really a part of this story. She hardly knew Rebecca, whose death is what sets off the whole story (though Leila chooses to start the telling of it with her visits to Janie, her father's first wife). There are so many parts to this story, but Rebecca, her life and death, is what ties it all together so marvelously. ( )

How do you come to terms with a father who lived a different life with a different family before you were born? How do you come to understand the suicide of a half-sister who forgot to say goodbye? How do you know if love will stay with you when you have evidence of it leaving all around you? For Leila Abrenel, whose life has been shaped by dyslexia, none of these questions are black or white, and the answers become more muddied when she falls in love and begins a relationship many would call scandolous based on a large age gap.

All I can say now is that Stay With Me is built on a foundation of many layers. All the nuances of love are explored throught a believable, honest narrative voice. Leila is not the kind of girl you'll find in chick-lit novels. She is as real as they come. Check out full review at http://athenasbooks.blogspot.com ( )

Leila is an only child of a second marriage. Her capable mother and distant father love her, but struggle to include her in their lives. She was close to her father's first wife Julia, and to her oldest half sister, Rebecca. But Julia's death from cancer, the 9/11 attacks on NYC, and most notably, Rebecca's sudden suicide, throw Leila's father into a tailspin. He throws himself into his work, leaving Lelia with her sister Claire while he and Leia's mother set up a teaching hospital in Warsaw. While living with Claire, Leila meets Eamon, a 31 year old screenwriter. Despite being attracted to Lelia, he refrains from pursuing a relationship with her, because he "doesn't date teenagers." However, as the book progresses, he and Leila grow closer, eventually begining a romantic and sexual relationship.

I honestly don't know how I feel about this book. Freymann-Weyr writes beautifully, her books have a lyric quality that I find beautiful and moving. However, I don't know anyone who acts like this. Her characters seem to move in a world of effortless money and privilege that is completely foreign. This isn't bad, necessarily, but it is distracting, and creates distance between the reader and the characters. The whole book seems skewed towards painting Eamon's and Leila's relationship as normal; but as a parent, I can't help but be skeeved out at the idea of a 17 year old, especially one as sheltered and naive as Lelia, embarking on a relationship with a 31 year old. Beautiful, but not recommended. (cross-posted from MeriJenBen) ( )