(Review) A World Without You

A World Without You by Beth Revis

Publication Date: July 19th, 2016

Pages: 384 (hardcover)

Genre: Young Adult

My Goodreads Rating: 2.5 stars

Goodreads Synopsis:
What if finding her means losing himself?
Seventeen-year-old Bo has always had delusions that he can travel through time. When he was ten, Bo claimed to have witnessed the Titanic hit an iceberg, and at fifteen, he found himself on a Civil War battlefield, horrified by the bodies surrounding him. So when his worried parents send him to a school for troubled youth, Bo assumes he knows the truth: that he’s actually attending Berkshire Academy, a school for kids who, like Bo, have “superpowers.”

At Berkshire, Bo falls in love with Sofía, a quiet girl with a tragic past and the superpower of invisibility. Sofía helps Bo open up in a way he never has before. In turn, Bo provides comfort to Sofía, who lost her mother and two sisters at a very young age.

But even the strength of their love isn’t enough to help Sofía escape her deep depression. After she commits suicide, Bo is convinced that she’s not actually dead. He believes that she’s stuck somewhere in time—that he somehow left her in the past, and that now it’s his job to save her. And as Bo becomes more and more determined to save Sofía, he must decide whether to face his demons head-on or succumb to a psychosis that will let him be with the girl he loves.


My Review: 

I've really been out of the loop with books lately, considering this one came out in 2016 and I'm just now reading it. I love Revis' Across the Universe trilogy and was excited to try this one, too. 

Bo is special. And by special I mean that he lives in an institute and has delusions that he can travel through time. That is pretty much the only special thing about him. Bo doesn't particularly care about anyone else, besides Sofia. 

Only Sofia is dead and Bo thinks he can save her by traveling through time. Actually, he thinks that he left Sofia back in time somewhere and that's why everyone thinks she's dead. 

Bo is so obsessed with finding Sofia and so convinced that he has superpowers that there really isn't anything else to this story. Only the chapters that Phoebe, Bo's sister, narrates do you actually get a glimpse of truth. 

While Bo's chapters truly feel like he's traveling through time, they get kind of redundant. The imagery is there. The words describing how he pulls strings and finds his way are interesting and it truly feels like you're reading about a kid who can travel through time. But a lot of the time that's all Bo is doing. And, while he thinks he traveling through time, he's just losing his actual time. 

I like how Phoebe is the one to kind of bring Bo back from the brink. He "sees" her future and thinks of all the things she could be. The parts where he thinks about his sister is, to me, Bo's only redeeming quality. It's not that he's a bad guy. He's just...Bo? 

This book had a good premise and interesting characters. I guess I was just hoping for more growth and more story, less inside Bo's head. Which might have been the point and, in that case, I missed it. 

Here's Chris Evans for your troubles.