Book 3 Listicle

Book 3 Listicle

5 Reasons Every Love Story is the Same.

Emma Simendinger

The book “What Happened to Goodbye” by author, Sarah Dessen writes yet another love story about a teenage girl, Mclean Sweet and her struggles of moving around a lot. Mclean’s parents becoming divorced and shutting down the family restaurant because of the “incident” where she loses the close relationship with her mom, and in the process of it all even loses herself, she even falls in love, and blah-blah-blah, like every romance story ever, it’s the exact same.

1.) She has a secret dark past

You always have that girl, that mysterious girl, which you just can’t seem to get through.

Mclean comes to a new school, is a gorgeous girl, people notice her, but the new attractive girl has a secret past standing in the way of any new friends. Her past life, with her parents, the family restaurant they owned, all of it gone, but why? “But in the real world, you couldn’t really just split a family down the middle, mom on one side, dad the other, with the child equally divided between. It was like when you ripped a piece of paper into two: no matter how you tried, the seams never fit exactly right again. It was what you couldn't see, those tiniest of pieces, which were lost in the severing, and their absence kept everything from being complete.” (Dessen) The fact that we got some information into her past, but stops there leaving us to figure out the rest, along with every other character in the book.

2.) She hides her true identity

                Mr. Sweet’s job in the food industry and the constant moving from town to town, it’s a perfect setting to set up a new girl to be every time they move. Whether she has invented herself into being Liza, Eliza, or Beth, at her new school she ends up going by her real name Mclean. All her past fake names and people, was her cover up to what her life use to be and why she doesn’t want to be the old girl she once was.  “All those clean, fresh starts had made me forget what it was like, until now, to be messy and honest and out of control. To be real.” (Dessen) She liked all the fresh starts, the reinventing every time she had her “fresh start” but the real her came out.

3.) The boy next store

                There isn’t a love story without the charming boy, with the golden looks and personality that sweeps you away. It just wouldn’t be natural without it. Dave Wade the neighbor boy, instantly crushes on Mclean when they meet while running from the cops after a huge party was being busted. The outgoing person he is keeps going for Mclean trying to figure her out, and what girl is she really. The back and forth flirting, then at the very end finally they confess their feelings. “You asked me to go out with you. I know you probably changed your mind. But you should know, the answer was yes. It's always been yes when it comes to you.” (Dessen) Mclean at this point in the book, when she says this line, finally comes to realization what she wants and confesses.

4.) He’s figured out the girl

                After Dave chases the girl he wants, trying to figure out why she is so mysterious, he finally gets the answers he wants. Slowly being let into Mclean’s guarded life and her huge past secret, and the reason for her parents’ divorce. “Odd how it was so easy for a stranger to assume such familiarity. Especially when those who were supposed to know you best often didn't, not at all.” (Dessen) He automatically understood her and continued to figure her out.

5.) The cliché ending

                So after getting past all the conflicts, like the typical downfall that causes the two lovers to break apart but they always come back together and forgive each other for some stupid fight or mistake they made. But of course it’s not till the very ending of the book they actually have the big moment of the confessing their feelings. Then from there it’s a happily ever after…“Once you love something, you always love it in some way. You have to. It’s, like, a part of you for good.” (Dessen) The cliché fight break up, not lasting forever but being fixed at the end. Every love story ends that way! Every single one.