A Million Miles Away by Lara Avery

A Million Miles Away is a weird story about a girl who assumes her twin sister's identity because she can't bring herself to tell her sister's boyfriend of her tragic unexpected death. 

Seniors, Kelsey and Michelle Maxfield are identical twins, so identical in fact, that few people can tell them apart. But that's where the similarity ends. Michelle is a budding artist who studies hard and can speak French. Kelsey is a dancer, more interested in keg parties than school and who dreams of making the cheerleading squad at KU (University of Kansas).

At a keg party at their home, Kelsey sees Michelle's latest boyfriend, Peter who is a soldier due to ship out to Afghanistan the next day. The morning, at breakfast Kelsey meets Peter who at first thinks he's talking to Michelle. While waiting for Michelle he tells Kelsey they met outside a concert three months ago and are quite serious about each other.

After Michelle does not return from driving Peter to the airport, they learn that she has been killed in a car accident. After the funeral, Kelsey's friends, Gillian and Ingrid try to comfort her and offer her support telling her not to worry about school. Weeks after Michelle's death, Kelsey still is unable to express the tremendous grief she feels over the loss of her sister. Her parents meanwhile have volunteered to host a support group for people grieving the loss of a loved one. When a postcard from Peter arrives for Michelle, Kelsey drives to the army recruiting office to see if they can help her locate Peter. However, the woman is unable to help Kelsey who does not know Peter's last name nor the unit he's with. This entire experience leaves Kelsey shattered and she breaks down at home.

Kelsey spends the next few weeks managing to catch up on her homework with the help of her long time boyfriend, Davis.Kelsey plans to audition for the University of Kansas Rock Chalk Dancers in May. Meanwhile Kelsey's mother asks her to cancel Michelle's facebook. After sending off an email to facebook, Kelsey is stunned to see Peter appear on Michelle's Skype. The connection is bad and even though Kelsey tries to tell him who she is, he believes he's talking to Michelle. Before she can go much further in telling him that Michelle has died, the call drops. A week later, Kelsey takes a second call from Peter who believes he's talking to Michelle and asks why she wasn't on to take his call last night. Kelsey learns that Peter's family know he has a girlfriend but not her identity so there is no way they would know that Michelle has died. Unable to tell Peter who she really is, because he seems upset by what is happening on his tour of duty, Kelsey promises to write him. Believing that Michelle "would protect him, at least until she could find a way to let him down gently, she feels she can't tell him by text or email.

Soon after, Peter's letters begin arriving. Filled with details about life in Kunar Province and the other soldiers in Peter's company, the letter tells Kelsey how much Michelle means to Peter. Kesley makes several unsuccessful attempts to write a letter to Peter. A third call from Peter sees Kelsey continue to pass herself off as Michelle.  Through these calls she has met his best friends, Sam and Rooster.
Peter tells her "Everything you say to me about home is, like, nourishing. You get it? It's like each memory is a piece of food that I can eat --"  Faced with the comfort she can bring to Peter and how pretending to be Michelle makes the hurt she's feeling somehow less, Kelsey decides to continue her deception.

When the call ends, the contrast between the comfort she gives Peter and the pain of grief she hears from her parents support group makes Kelsey decide that she does not want Peter to experience that kind of pain. But how long can Kelsey continue the deception and at what cost to herself and to Peter?

Discussion

A Million Miles Away is a story about a young woman who struggles to cope with the loss of her identical twin and to rediscover her own identity amid the pain and chaos she's feeling. At it's heart is a theme of identity.

Kelsey finds that Michelle's death has changed her irrevocably and that she's unable to move forward. As twins, both Michelle and Kelsey would be attending college next year. But with Michelle gone, Kelsey already recognizes that her death has changed her. "She wasn't herself. No matter how much she tried, she wasn't sure she ever would be herself again. The next phase in her life seemed impossible. It was impossible."

Kelsey feels her face, so identical to that of her dead sister, is a reminder to everyone around her, including her father, of Michelle's death."She was a reminder to everybody. She had no choice. People in the hallways, people on the sidewalk, people in the grocery store. Their eyes widened and they drew in breath...Michelle used to make people smile, not cringe."

When the art teacher, Mrs. Wallace asks Kelsey about how she is coping with her sister's death, Kelsey tells her "It's like, I had my opposite my whole life...So I knew exactly who I was. I knew who I was because I knew who I wasn't. And now she's gone." Mrs. Wallace reminds Kelsey that she has her whole life to figure out who she is. However, for Kelsey, pretending to be Michelle helps her cope with her own pain and makes her feel as though she is moving forward in life. Also getting to know her sister better has the ulterior motive of aiding her in her deceit, even though she doesn't admit this to herself.

Kelsey not only pretends to be Michelle when she's talking online with Peter, she also begins to act as Michelle would - she takes Michelle's Art History class. When her friend Gillian discovers that Kelsey has not told Peter about Michelle's death, Kelsey tells herself "With Peter, I can pretend it never happened. And I like talking to him..." Gillian reminds Kelsey that she has a long time boyfriend as well, who also will be hurt to discover her carrying on a relationship with Peter. Eventually her deception leads to larger lies and bigger deceit when she goes to Paris to meet Peter and his friends, pretending she is Michelle. However, Peter's friend, Sam, does see through Kelsey's deceit and reminds her that she needs to tell him. She also meets his family, pretending to be Michelle and eventually becomes intimate with Peter, also with Peter believing he is with Michelle. This all leads to the terrible confrontation between Peter and Kelsey when he finally returns home and the truth is revealed to him.

It takes Kelsey's mother to explain to her what she should have known all along, that what she did was selfish and wrong. However, Kelsey rationalizes her behaviour,  "I missed her...I really didn't mean to pretend to be her...It was mostly just wanting to be close to her again, you know? Even closer than I was when she was alive." While it's understandable that Kelsey doesn't want to do anything that might endanger Peter while he's on his tour of duty in Afghanistan, it seems remarkable that she couldn't find some other way to notify Peter about what happened to her sister and his girlfriend. Especially after she learns his last name and that his sister has been trying to locate Michelle on Facebook. 

It was difficult to read this novel, because of the harm that the main character, Kelsey is doing to everyong involved: Peter, his family, her family and their friends. She is immature and selfish.  The harm she has done to Peter is evident: Peter and Kelsey resume their relationship after a brief breakup. Because of course, Peter acknowledges that Kelsey kept him alive during his difficult tour, which while true, doesn't seem to make up for the incredible deception on Kelsey's part. He seems to have no problem forgiving her and is eager to resume the relationship with Kelsey, making one wonder if he's simply unable or unwilling to come to terms with Michelle's death.

Most of the other characters in A Million Miles Away are very underdeveloped and even insignificant. This includes Kelsey's friends, Gillian and Ingrid, her boyfriend of three years - Davis, and her parents who seem completely consumed by their involvement in their grief support group.

Overall, a strange twist using the familiar trope of identical twins assuming each others identities.

Book Details:

A Million Miles Away by Lara Avery
Boston: Little, Brown and Company 2015
306 pp.

Anything But Ordinary by Lara Avery

Anything But Ordinary is a book filled with much promise but which ultimately will leave readers disappointed.

Seventeen year old Bryce Graham is a promising diver who suffers a devastating, coma-inducing brain injury during an Olympic trials dive competition. Anything But Ordinary opens when Bryce awakens five years later in Vanderbilt Medical Center in Nashville, Tennessee.

Her younger sister, Sydney, is now seventeen, her father's hair is grayer and things have changed immensely as Bryce is about to learn. She has missed graduating from Hilwood High and four years of college. Bryce wonders about what has happened to her best friends and teammates, Greg and Gabby.

In the days immediately after awakening from the coma, Bryce makes a remarkable recovery. She can talk, use her hands and use a wheelchair. She is even beginning to stand and take a few steps. This makes her recovery all the more astounding and of interest to researchers in neurology. Although Bryce's recovery appears to be going well. However she is having strange visions accompanied by intense pain. While most of the visions are of events that have already happened, Bryce does have a vision of the future as well. She decides that she will not tell anyone about what is happening, despite being asked about her memory by her doctor, Dr. Warren.

Dr. Warren, who suspects Bryce isn't being truthful about what's going on, wants Bryce to remain in hospital for several more weeks to undergo tests, but Bryce wants to leave as soon as possible. Anxious to get on with her life, Bryce is allowed to go home. At home though, Bryce discovers that life for her family has changed a great deal. Her parents argue and are no longer close. Her father has quit coaching and stopped working on the airplane he was building. And her sister Sydney is a party animal, often getting drunk and staying out late at night to party.

As she begins to take her life back and heal from her brain injury, Bryce feels trapped by her past and the years she has missed. While she has been in a coma, life has gone on for Gabby and Greg, both of whom went to Stanford instead of Vanderbuilt which they received scholarships for.  Bryce's world is further turned upside down when she learns that Gabby and Greg are engaged to be married and that they are moving to D.C where Gabby will study law. Greg was Bryce's boyfriend before her accident and now she must come to terms with the fact that he is marrying her best friend. This is even more difficult because Gabby seems oblivious to the effect this has on Bryce whom she has asked to be her maid of honour.

When Bryce returns to Vanderbilt for a CAT scan, she has a vision while undergoing the scan. The results puzzle her doctors but she refuses to stay in hospital and has her new friend, Carter, who is a second year medical student drive her home. Bryce continues to prepare for Gabby and Greg's wedding, by agreeing to be Gabby's maid of honour and going shopping for dresses. Greg, however, is having second thoughts about the wedding and tells Bryce he is still in love with her. He begins to see her behind Gabby's back and although Bryce tries to discourage him and continually walks away from him, she does become involved with him again, while also beginning a relationship with Carter.

Bryce tries to encourage her parents to reclaim their lives again and to develop a life outside of looking after her. She eventually manages to talk to Sydney and come to an understanding of what her younger sister's life must have been like while she was in a coma for five years and her parent's life revolved around keeping watch at the hospital. It takes Sydney to help Bryce come to the realization that her relationship with Greg belongs in the past. At the rehearsal dinner when Greg once again confronts Bryce about his marriage to Gabby, Bryce asks him what he really wants in life and tells him that this is something he alone must determine. At this time, Carter reveals to Bryce the result of the earlier CAT scan and the true state of her health.

Discussion

While the concept behind Anything But Ordinary was interesting, the novel succeeds on some levels and not on others. Lara Avery does a great job of portraying the difficulties a young person might encounter after being sidelined for just long enough to make a substantial difference. Bryce is physically twenty-two years old but still emotionally only seventeen-years-old. While her friends have finished university and are socially more mature, Bryce is still very much a teen. She's also dealing with the trauma of being in a coma for so long. The author also does a good job of capturing the emotional toll of Bryce's injury on her family. For example, Sydney who feels abandoned by both her parents as they focus on Bryce, rebels with her goth clothing and acting out.

Because Bryce's physical abilities return so quickly (she is walking within a matter of days) that aspect of her recovery takes a second hand to the relationships in her life - especially her friends from high school.  In fact, the relationship between Gabby, Greg and Bryce dominates the storyline. Rather than focusing on her recovery, Bryce becomes completely focused on Greg and Gabby, who have developed a life together but which gradually unwinds after Bryce comes back into their lives. Bryce seems unable to come to terms with their relationship and to recognize the blossoming interest of her new friend Carter, who has more than a passing interest in her. She repeatedly tells Greg that she doesn't want to meet him again, yet continues to do so.

Greg is confused and behaves in a very dishonorable way by refusing to acknowledge that he is be unfaithful to Gabby, as he meets Bryce and pursues a physical relationship with Bryce. And Gabby doesn't seem to recognize Greg's interest in Bryce. This strange triangle is frustrating and yet predictable. Readers will surmise that Greg is probably going to call off the wedding and when he does, it's really no surprise.

Bryce's recovery was not portrayed in a realistic manner. She received little help in terms of psychological counselling to help her pick up the pieces of her life. She was simply allowed to sign out of the hospital because she was legally an adult and she refused to return for check-ups. This was ostensibly due to the visions which Bryce wanted to keep secret, but this wasn't believable.  The visions were never really explained and while most were of events that happened while Bryce was in a coma, one inexplicably was of a future event that allowed Bryce to save her sister. It's likely this was done because the focus of the novel was on the love triangle that forms the main plot of the novel.

Near the end of the novel, Bryce finally confronts Sydney, who has suddenly "burnt out" from her bad behaviour and now appears to be open to talking to her sister. Bryce learns what life has been like for Sydney for the past five years. This was a very interesting scene and it was unfortunate their relationship wasn't explored in more depth the book. The ending of the novel is shocking and disappointing, considering the actions of Bryce.

Anything But Ordinary had much potential, but lots of loose ends and characters with little depth.  A great cover and an interesting opening chapter will draw readers in. They will stay to find out what happens but will be left with lots of questions.

Book Details:
Anything But Ordinary by Lara Avery
New York: Hyperion       2012
327 pp.