UpSpark (The Five Elements Book 1) – Nicole Wells
Synopsis
“It just takes a spark, Enya. You don’t need to be anything more than you.”
When Enya learns she has a terminal disease the summer before college, her dreams to make a difference in the world are cut short. Instead, she joins her best friend Jacob on a cross country road trip to explore his Native American roots. Psychic visions are just the start as Enya embarks on a spiritual journey that will break the world she knows, and open her to more than she could have imagined.
Review
For when there is nothing real in the world except love, it all starts and ends with the heart.
This review was particularly hard for me. I really don’t know how to explain how I feel about this book without spoilers, but I’ll do my best.
I want to clarify immediately that my rating for this book is not a bad one, it just didn’t fit enough my liking style for giving it more, but I do know that it’s an amazing book that a lot of people can love.
This book tells the story about Enya, an 18-year-old girl whose life has just been destroyed. She got tested and got positive for Huntington’s disease. A progressive brain disorder that leads to lost of control, for mind and body. Her father also had it, and his mother before. He actually couldn’t take it anymore and committed suicide a few years ago.
When Enya gets her result, she feels her life is officially over. But on a desperate attempt to get some happiness back, she decides to join Jacob, her best friend, while he travels in a RV trying to get closer to hit Native American roots.
“We can’t choose the cards we’re dealt. We can choose how we react, though, what we make of it.”
This trip not only gives Enya a peace she never expected, but is also the beginning of one of the sweetest friends-to-lovers relationships I’ve read.
“When I look at you, I see all that is good in the world. You help me have faith in humanity.” He turns to me, a sheepish smile bringing youth to his face, “That’d be pretty awesome if you led the world, kiddo. Acupuncture Heart or not, you’ve got love, compassion, and unselfishness in spades.”
Enya discovers that meditation helps her, so she starts doing it a lot. And somehow this leads to visions, that will be what leads the story.
This book remembers me of Release, book that I actually didn’t enjoy (although I loved the rest of the saga and hope it will be the same with this one).
The book has a huge focus on helping you learn that love is everything, and not only as a couple. Learning to love herself and the others is what allows Enya to keep going with her life and actually enjoy it.
And it’s amazing when I truly let the love in, how I see it and find it everywhere. How it self propagates. My world is a joyous place. That doesn’t mean that bad things don’t happen, and it doesn’t mean my diagnosis has changed. It just means that I choose happiness. I choose love. It’s like Jacob had said. What if every moment was a choice? Full stop. No past, no future, just this moment, and I have the power of a choice.
It also has a big focus on showing a little of the story of Native American people, and all the things they lived.
One of the things I didn’t love about the book is how many hard subjects were at the beginning. We find out Enya has Huntington’s, Jacob is looking for his Native roots, and we get a lot of information about this. And Yasmin, Enya’s best friend, is Muslim and lesbian, which means her family sort of exiled her. I actually liked all of this, but felt too much information at once.
Also, Enya leans a lot in homeopathy and acupuncture, but this subjects felt more natural in the story.
The other thing that bothered me was the format. The story is told on Enya’s POV (except for one chapter on Jacob’s) but before every chapter we have a scene, that seems to be from visions, but this honestly confused me a lot.
What I did love were the characters. All of them were complex and real, with their own stories. It was impossible not to fell in love with Enya and Jacob.
“Jacob, how do you not get angry?”
“Oh, I get angry. I’m a little more practiced at catching it. Anger is like poison. You speak angry words to a plant as you harvest it, and the food when you are angry, and you are serving poison. When you have a lifetime of viewing the importance of it like that, you get lots of practice at halting your reaction before you say or do something stupid.”
The thing with this book is that half of me loved it, and the other half hates it.
[su_spoiler title=”I can’t explain this without spoilers so, here they are (this are not big spoilers but I prefer to warn)” icon=”chevron-circle”] I loved how the book is constantly giving you hope, and making you learn to forgive and live your life day by day. But I just couldn’t handle the ending. I know I should have seen it coming, but it felt like such a hit of reality that I got mad.
[/su_spoiler]
Woaaaa, I almost forget! There’s so much Taylor Swift in this book ?. Jacob is a huge fan. I love her too, so this was pretty awesome.
Jacob’s amazingly perceptive in picking up on all my moods and cues for a guy. Must be all the Taylor Swift music. Yasmin and I like to tease him incessantly for being such a Swiftie. I’m more of a Twenty One Pilots girl myself.
As you can see, this is not a bad book. Just wasn’t the perfect one for me at the time. Actually, I would blindly recommend it to you if you need to remember how to find hope in the darkest moments. If you need a reminder that a spark is all that it takes.
“Things happen for a reason. And we’re not given things we can’t handle. You were given this because you are so strong. You might not feel it now, but you are. Strong and amazing. Let your light shine, don’t let some uncertain future dim it.”
Bye bye ?
