Day: July 13, 2021

Book Review: The In Between by Marc Klein

The In Between
Author: Marc Klein

Published:  June 1, 2021
304 Pages

Reviewed By: Jessica
Dates Read: June 21- June 30, 2021
Jessica’s Rating: 4 stars 

Book Description:

After bouncing around in foster homes for most of her childhood, seventeen-year-old Tessa Jacobs doesn’t believe she deserves love — not from her adoptive parents, and certainly not from anyone at school.

But everything changes when she has a chance encounter at the local movie theater with Skylar, a senior from a neighboring town who’s a true romantic. Their budding relationship quickly leads to the kind of passionate love you only see in the movies. And Tessa starts to believe she might be deserving of a happy ending after all.

When tragedy strikes, Tessa wakes up alone in the hospital with no memory of how she got there. And Skylar has passed away. As Tessa begins her relentless search for answers, Skylar’s spirit reaches out to her from the other side. Desperate to see him one last time, Tessa must unravel the pieces of their relationship — and the truth might even lead her into the afterlife itself.

Jessica’s Review:

The In Between is a sweet YA story that deals with first love and the loss of that love. Tessa has gone from foster home to foster home and feels she doesn’t deserve any kind of love and she has built up walls. One morning after snow has fallen, Tessa decides to go out and take photos with her ‘vintage’ 35 mm camera versus today’s digital camera.  Photography is Tessa’s passion and she even develops the photos herself.  And yes, she only takes black and white photos. 

Taking a break from the cold, Tessa goes to the old movie theater to watch a film… That ends up being in French… And Tessa doesn’t know French…One other person comes into the theater who ends up sitting next to her and says he will translate for her.  He’s a teenage boy around her age.  His name is Skylar and this is the start of what will end up becoming first love for Tessa. 

But this first love isn’t to last, as we know from the book description that Tessa wakes in the hospital with no memory and then has to be told that Skylar has died in an accident.  And Tessa literally died and was brought back. She has a literal and figurative broken heart. 

This is just the beginning of The In Between.  The novel jumps back and forth from before the accident and just days after the accident.  We see the relationship between Tessa and Skylar grow, and we also get some possible paranormal activity: Skylar is seemingly trying to reach out to Tessa from beyond the grave.

Yes, this story is an ‘insta-love’ one that mainly takes place over a summer, but it is a YA story and don’t most of those novels deal with insta-love?  The chapters are short and this is a quick moving story that is a short novel at just over 300 pages.  It appears that it will become a movie at some point, and I will see it.  No, I did not cry reading the book though I wondered if I was going to as we already know the end of Tessa’s and Skylar’s story from the start.  I do see myself crying when the film is released. 

I really enjoyed this novel and look forward to the future film.  Many thanks to the publisher for granting me a copy to read and review through Amazon Vine.

Purchase Links:
Amazon US
Amazon UK