Promise Me Tomorrow by Donna Jo Stone - Review

Book Synopsis:

For sixteen-year-old Nina, communicating her emotions is ridiculously hard. She expresses those best through art, the one thing she’s good at. When she’s chosen to design the school mural, she’s ecstatic. It’s a chance to connect with Mom and make her proud, because even though they don’t always see eye to eye, Mom always loves Nina’s art. But Nina’s joy is cut short by the news that her mother's cancer has returned, and this time it’s terminal.

Nina can't accept Mom's decision to refuse further treatment. There must be a way to save her. If Mom won't find it, Nina will.

Consumed by her obsession to find a cure, Nina risks alienating the people she needs most—her friends, her family, and the boy who only wants to help.

Is it better to let Mom make her own choices about treatment, or should Nina keep pressing for a miracle, even if it builds an emotional wall between them?

My Review:

Note: I received an ARC of this book in exchange for an honest review

"It was hard for a person to believe they were who God intended them to be when the world kept saying otherwise."

3.75/5 stars. This was a sweet story with very great autism representation, but it needs polishing. There were a lot of grammatical mistakes -- but I recognize that some of those could be due to it being an ARC. I would've liked the romance between Nina and Cody to be developed and shown a bit more, not just told. I also feel like the plot took a bit to get going. As for the ending, I appreciate the realness of it and how it doesn't end with everything perfectly happy and nice, but it shows the family moving on from loss.

The autism representation was the best part of this book. It was very well done and accurate; the author knew what she was writing about. There were two different levels of autism represented. Will had more clearly defined autism, whereas Nina was presumably undiagnosed and experienced sensory and emotional processing issues to a lesser degree. It was unclear what exactly Nina had, but the author was very helpful to answer my questions when I sent her an email. Both of these portrayals of autism were accurate. They had outbursts and hard moments, but they were also just normal people. They weren't infantilized, but they also weren't shown as being completely faultless. I loved the way Nina's autism was shown through her observations and internal monologue.

I enjoyed the characters. The main ones were very well-rounded. There were times when I was annoyed with Nina for her actions and attitude, but I could understand where she was coming from. Her emotions throughout the story were show well, and so was the nuance of certain situations. She wasn't entirely right or wrong in some cases.

There was a sweet romance in this book, but it was lacking. I didn't get invested or swoon over it, mostly because it was told to us more than shown. Cody was a nice guy, but we barely saw any cute moments or banter between him and Nina. I was passively reading about how great he is and how they had little moments, but I never actually saw any of that enough to be invested. It had the childhood-best-friends-to-lovers trope, which I love, but it wasn't developed enough.

The plot was interesting -- I was never bored or wanting to stop reading -- but it was a little too slow-moving. It took a while for things to get going, and even after that, it felt like things were dragged out a bit too long. There also weren't as many Christian elements as I would've liked for a Christian YA. However, the bit about autism and being God's creation, as referenced at the beginning of this review, got to me. That was very sad and sweet.

Content:

Language: None

Sexual Content: A mention of someone looking at a man's backside, Nina thinking about/wanting to be kissed, a mention of "the sex talk", cheek kisses, light kisses not described

Violence/Gore: None

Drugs/Alcohol: None