In An Instant (Suzanne Redfearn)

In An Instant
Suzanne Redfearn
Lake Union Publishing
Fiction, YA? General Fiction
***+ (Okay/Good)

DESCRIPTION: It was supposed to be a fun weekend in the mountains for sixteen-year-old Finn, skiing and hanging out in the family cabin. Mo's overprotective mother even let the teen girl go with them, which almost makes up for the inclusion of her sister Chloe's beach bum boyfriend/near-constant lip accessory Vance, not to mention the obnoxious girl Natalie, daughter of family friends and fellow guests "Aunt" Karen and "Uncle" Bob.
Then everything went wrong.
Suddenly, their trailer is plunging over a frozen embankment, swallowed by a blizzard in the deep woods.
Killed in the accident, young Finn can only watch helplessly as everyone struggles to survive. The worst challenge, though, waits in the weeks to come. The crash didn't just gash foreheads and break legs and steal fingers and toes to frostbite: it shattered decades of friendship and self-delusion - and not everyone can handle knowing who they truly are at heart.

REVIEW: In An Instant is a tale about tragedy and the aftermath of trauma. Finn is not the only family member to die in the fateful crash, but she is the only one seemingly tethered to Earth by those who loved her... or seemed to love her. Choices made during the hours lost in the blizzard reveal sometimes-ugly truths, but it's rarely a clear-cut case of right or wrong, and Finn learns that it's not so easy to judge, even as forgiveness can be difficult. Finn's parents, already in rocky times, see what's left of their relationship fray to bare threads. Her surviving sister loses the man she thought she loved to something worse than death, and seems determined to follow Finn to the afterlife. The family friends - "Uncle" Bob, "Aunt" Karen, and their obnoxious teen girl Natalie - see the illusions that held their family together destroyed. And Mo, whose mother nearly smothers her, proves to be the strongest and most determined of them all, struggling to uncover the truth of what happened even as everyone re-imagines the truth into skewed fictions that are easier to live with. It's an often-harrowing read, and the journeys faced by the characters are full of setbacks and twists. At times, unfortunately, it skews too preachy; it nudges up to the religious fiction line and actually steps across now and again, though for the most part it avoids dogma. The ending provides some closure and justice, but there will always be scars and memories, and some wounds may never fully heal. Ultimately, it's not a bad tale of survival and trauma. I just wish I'd known about the religious angle beforehand...

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