Sunshine is Forever

Trigger Warning - this book contains descriptions of self-harm, suicide attempts and sexual assault. If any of these are triggers for you, please stay safe while reading this book.

Um, is it politically incorrect to say you enjoyed a book about depressed teens who have attempted suicide? Oh, well, here goes ... I really enjoyed reading Sunshine is Forever.

Growing up reading The Baby-Sitters Club books I was determined to go to camp in America and have fun with a bunch of new friends from camp like Kristy and co. Even after watching all of the Friday the 13th movies I still wanted to be a camp counsellor. Much to my dismay I never went to camp as a kid or counsellor, but find me a book about teenagers going to camp, any camp, and I want to read it.

So, here we are at Camp Sunshine which incidentally leaned closer to Friday the 13th (minus the sex) than BSC. In fact, had Jason shown up to deal with Asshole Jim around the time of his introduction I probably would have happily provided him with directions and a mug shot.

I would hope that Camp Sunshine would never get accreditation to open in the first place because other than half an hour of token therapy a day, the workers may as well have been singing Kumbaya with the kids for all the good they were doing. A padded cell used as punishment? Really??? I kept thinking as I was reading this book, 'please don't let this resemble the way mental health is dealt with in America', but having seen some documentaries about American LGBTQ conversion therapy I wondered how far from the truth it actually was.

My time reading this book was divided between smiling at Hunter's observations and monikers he chose for his family, friends and prison guards (oops, sorry, therapy staff) and sadness at the situation all of these teenagers were in. With themes including guilt, forgiving ourselves and others, and taking responsibility for our actions there were obviously going to be portions of the book that were very difficult to read but like witnessing an imminent train crash I couldn't look away. I had to know if the crash was going to happen or if there'd be a near miss.

Hunter's conviction that it was only through Corin's love and acceptance of him that he could be happy was both sad and believable. It's much easier to assign roles for other people to attempt to make them responsible for the outcome of our lives than to look inside and take responsibility for ourselves.

I spent most of the book waiting as patiently as possible to find out what secrets were hidden in Corin's thick green file and wasn't surprised at their theme when all was revealed. However hard it was to read I did like the symmetry it set up between Corin and Hunter. While the noose around Hunter's stomach was guilt, Corin's noose was shame.

I loved the point made that you get out of therapy what you're willing to put in to it. I would've really liked to have read that miscalculations had been renamed at the end in conjunction with Hunter taking responsibility for his actions, but that's essentially nitpicking.

I liked that some things were left undone at the end. It wouldn't have worked as well if everything was wrapped up with a pretty bow. Life's messy and while we'd love to believe in them, Insta-Fixes aren't as plentiful as we'd like to think.

I felt this one sentence summed up depression better than the DSM-5 could ever hope to - "If you knew me, you probably wouldn't like me, either."

I received a free ARC of this book from NetGalley (thank you very much to NetGalley and Inkshares) in exchange for honest feedback. Please note that the quote above is from the ARC and may change prior to publication (but I hope it doesn't). I would recommend this book to teenagers and adults alike but would provide trigger warnings first. I definitely want to read it again.

“See, this is the problem,” she started. “This is what they do to us. They force us to evaluate our lives, as if we can turn back time. But you and I both know that we aren’t time travelers, and we can’t change the past.”

I am crazily shocked by how much I loved this book. It's one of the special books that you knew you were going love it, but then you actually read it and it blows you away 1000x more than you expected it to. That was exactly what happened with this book. I'm still just like holy wow that was amazing. There is seriously like nothing I can think about to complain about this. Okay though, I won't lie, I think a few people should stay away from this though because there a lot of potential triggers. The biggest is, of course, suicide and there is self-harm as well as depression. Though the one thing that made this book even more amazing was how brutally honest it is. I'm also not going to completely dive into the review because this one doesn't come out for awhile and don't want to spoil some things. THOUGH THERE WILL BE A FEW SPOILERS, BUT THEY WILL BE MARKED OKAY?? so read the spoiler sections at your own risk (since some people will read past the spoiler warning and get upset because they got spoiled :)

Overview of the Story:
Hunter, our main character, has the idea wrapped around his head that being with someone will cure him of his depression. Uhmm it's pretty interesting to see why he thinks so, and why he is depressed. But there is one incident in his life that he labels "The Incident" which is what makes him suicidal and what makes him depressed. And yes, this book has a HUGE focus on suicide, which I enjoyed because it wasn't trying to glorify suicide with romantic notions, or excuse suicide as something that is normal and that happens. But I'll come back to that later lol. OKAY so, since he's depressed (lets see how many times I can say that in this review AHA) his parents are sending him to Camp Sunshine. This camp is a place for recovering ex-suicidies (okay what do you call someone who tried to kill themselves but didn't end up making it? I don't think ex-suicidies is a good word at ALL lolololol hopefully you understand what I'm trying to say) So anyways, Camp Sunshine is the equivalent to HELL in our world okay, it's a horrible place with horrible people, with the exception of one Counselor who I actually liked. Anyways, the whole point was for him to recover from his depression and suicidal thoughts, but it isn't easy, which the author portrays so WELL. OML I can't tell y'all how important and amazing this book is.

What I Loved #1:
I connected so much with Hunter. There was quite a bit about him that I really couldn’t connect to due to his personal life that didn’t match mine. But his beliefs on suicide and death are pretty much exactly my beliefs. Here is a quote showing exactly his viewpoint and thoughts on suicide as well as self-harm. (spoiler regarding a character in quote number three, but I didn’t put his name in their so you can still read it)

”The truth is that suicide isn’t that sad to me— in a lot of ways, suicide is a relief. The person’s family no longer has to deal with a rainstorm every day and the person is finally free of the lightning storm that had consumed their life.”


"Suicide is a culmination of thousands of bad moments built up into one single event. Suicide is a way out when it doesn’t seem like any alternative exists. Suicide is the only choice when a person can’t find any way to feel happy. Suicide is escape.”


and:

"I realized that if (name) didn’t cut himself, then eventually his pain would erupt out of him in an action that was way worse than a cut on his thigh. The truth was that I didn’t think they had to do anything at all. (name) should have the right to self-inflict pain if he wanted. We all should have complete control over how we live our lives— or if we even want to live them at all.”


Okay though I want to say that in no way do I think self-harm or suicide are healthy. Or acceptable way of leaving life. Do I understand the want to leave life and just end it all? Of course I do. But I also don’t think it’s okay. Do I understand the need to inflict pain on yourself because it’s something that helps? Of course I do. But again I don’t think it’s okay. I don’t think it’s healthy at all, but I still agree with him. I feel like sometimes, that some books will come at suicide or self-harm like it’s this heinous crime and no one should EVER think about it or try it. It’s pretty much the highest of Sins according to a majority of the novels I’ve read. BUT this one shows that it’s something that we think about. It’s a realistic thought process and it’s harsh, but it’s true. This aspect just made me love the book 100x more.

What I Loved #2:
I loved the male friendship in this book. To me, it’s very rare to see realistic male friendships. All the guys in a book always either hate each other, or they have no emotional connection at ALL. My absolute favorite male friendship of all time is, of course, Will Herondale and James Carstairs. They love each other but they still crack jokes and are just friends. I really loved Quints and Hunters friendship because they started off rough, okay REALLY rough, but they ended up being best buds and it was great. They trusted each other (somewhat) and cracked jokes and made fun but were still friends and it was AWESOME.

The Craziest Love Interest I’ve Ever Met:
Now this love interest is INTERESTING. Very interesting. She’s made out to be the prettiest perfect girl in this camp and she can not be TRUSTED. Nope. Nope. Nope. But she’s also been this camp THREE times. THREE TIMES LIKE WHAT EVEN?? But um yeah I learned early on that she is just hmmm … yeah weird. LOL but then the ending comes around and you find out exactly why she is the way she is and it’s EMOTIONAL. AGH that whole ending scene is CRAZY emotional and unexpected and crazy and I just cannot explain it.

Quotes:

”Funny how happiness hits us when we least expect it.”

”I couldn’t subdue my demons— my demons had already consumed me.”

“You can’t be happy unless you know how to feel sad, but you also can’t let yourself be sad for all of eternity. Focusing on your past will only bring back more pain.”

Everything about this book was 6/5 stars. I didn’t hate anything about it and Mr. Cowan is definitely a new “Auto-Buy” author. ALSO I want to throw in that the writing is crazy flowery, or just super flowy. It’s nice writing that fits the story perfectly and fits the pace and it’s 11/10.

I found this book to be a complete emotional rollercoaster and I loved every second of it! Initially, I loved the idea of the perspective coming from a (Hilarious) quirky, teenage boy who struggles with his own insecurities. I found the beginning to be very straight forward and I think that is what lured me in so easily. I felt that there was never a dull moment in the novel even from the beginning and that alone was something that brought me to really love this book. I also really loved the character's that Hunter interacted with and found their descriptions incredibly funny.
While I thought that this book was only going to evoke feelings of both, happiness and sadness, I found myself biting my nails in anticipation and getting nervous at times. I loved that Cowan kept his readers in the dark about the initial reason that our main character ended up in this "Camp Sunshine" and even though hints were dropped that helped readers figure it out before it was said, there was still the mystery that was Corin Snow Young.
Overall, I found this book to be funny, heartbreaking and intense. I would highly recommend it to anyone who was a fan of E. Lockhart's "We Were Liars." Though there were moments early on in the story that made me worry about how people would feel that the author was presenting depression, as I kept reading I learned that there was extreme growth in our main character's understanding of their depression.
I will definetly be looking for a phsycial copy of the book in stores!