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  • After the Moment5

    Gaby @ Starting Fresh The book opens at a dinner party in New York City, when Leigh sees Maia Moreland for the first time since high school. We're immediately aware of her impact on him and that he's never gotten over some event in their past where he did something dreadful. We don't know their history, only that there was something beautiful and fragile that was destroyed somehow and that Leigh has carried this with him for years.

    After reading the opening pages of their chance encounter at the NY dinner party, I was pushed so off-center that I put the book down for weeks. I didn't want to read about the violence or how Leigh hurt Maia so badly and was still so affected by their past. I won't go into details - you deserve to read the book without any spoilers - and to enjoy it as the story slowly unfolds.

    Here is just a quick peek into the plot and characters:
    After the brief scene where Leigh and Maia meet in the present, the main story opens in flashbacks to Leigh's last years in high school. Towards the end of his junior year, seventeen-year-old Leigh has everything going for him - excellent grades, a spot on the soccer team, and Astra, his dropdead beautiful, popular and smart girlfriend that most everyone else wants to date. He's not unappreciative of his life even though "the good fortune that Leigh knew as his wasn't something that he could feel or point to...It was more like oxygen or blood; it was that intrinsic." Leigh knows that he doesn't yet know what future he wants but he's steady and dependable and he does his level best, knowing it's "a matter of continuing to do the right things: study and apply to colleges, as well as keep old friends and make new ones." Though Leigh isn't driven by clear plans for his future, he will do almost anything for his younger step sister Millie. So when Millie's father dies and she asks Leigh to move to Maryland for a year, Leigh uproots his life. He leaves New York, his mother and Astra for Maryland, Millie, and her troubled friend Maia. Maia is the polar opposite of Astra - nervous, eating disordered, and troubled - but somehow Leigh finds himself drawn to her.

    Once I got over my initial hesitation and returned to the book, got to know Leigh and how he cared for the people around him, I was hooked. In After the Moment, Garret Freymann-Weyr created unforgettable characters dealing with complex and real life concerns. It's a beautiful and moving book.

    Publisher: Houghton Mifflin Books for Children; 1 edition (May 18, 2009), 336 pages.
    Review copy provided by the author and TLC Book Tours. by Gaby @ Starting Fresh

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