✨ ARC Review - The Lucky Ones by Liz Lawson ✨

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Title: The Lucky Ones

Author: Liz Lawson

Genre: YA Contemporary 

Rating: ☕️☕️☕️☕️☕️

Page Length: 352

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I know this review is super late, I got behind, and I majorly regret not reading this one sooner. It was amazing. 

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Blurb: 

How do you put yourself back together when it seems like you've lost it all?

May is a survivor. But she doesn't feel like one. She feels angry. And lost. And alone. Eleven months after the school shooting that killed her twin brother, May still doesn't know why she was the only one to walk out of the band room that day. No one gets what she went through--no one saw and heard what she did. No one can possibly understand how it feels to be her. 

Zach lost his old life when his mother decided to defend the shooter. His girlfriend dumped him, his friends bailed, and now he spends his time hanging out with his little sister...and the one faithful friend who stuck around. His best friend is needy and demanding, but he won't let Zach disappear into himself. Which is how Zach ends up at band practice that night. The same night May goes with her best friend to audition for a new band. 

Which is how May meets Zach. And how Zach meets May. And how both might figure out that surviving could be an option after all.

Review:

This was an intense, and extremely emotional read. The Lucky Ones is Liz Lawsons debut novel, but I never would have guessed it if I hadn’t known. 

The Lucky Ones follows the story of May, who is dealing with the aftermath of a school shooting that took her twin brothers life along with five other students and a teacher. And Zach, who’s mother who has taken on the case, and defense, of the person responsible for the shooting. 

This story is not an easy one, but it is most definitely an important one. I think that Liz Lawson has done an amazing job of portraying the aftermath of something this horrendous, and what May is going through. And even Zach, with having to deal with his own mother taking on the defense of someone who has committed such an atrocious act, and the repercussions that that has brought to Zach and his family’s life. 

When Zach and Mays lives collide, it starts a journey of self discovery, pain, healing, friendship, and love. Even in the midst of so much heartbreak and pain. It’s not an easy path for either of them. They both have so much to work through. But they find a little light in the darkness with each other. 

This book made me cry, a lot. It had me feeling it all. This story is so important, especially in todays times. What May, and even Zach, are left to deal with in the aftermath of the shooting is nothing less than tragic. It's a story of so much fear and pain, but also one of hope. 

I really appreciated the very real portrayal of teenagers in this book. A lot of Young Adult books try to make teens in books seem way more innocent than reality. Liz Lawson did a great job of showing what teenagers are really like. It’s hard enough being a teen, all the hormones, trying to figure yourself out, let alone trying to deal with a tragedy like this on top of it all. It’s rough. And she showed the reality of that. And that makes this story so much more real while reading, along with everything else. 

Absolutely fantastic debut. I really loved The Lucky Ones. I loved Liz Lawsons writing. This book was heart wrenching, and painful. But it was also full of love, friendship, and hope.    

*ARC kindly provided through NetGalley by Delacorte Press. All thoughts and opinions are my own.*

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- Danielle