Betty has been longing for a green dress, a reward for her hard work. This was the promise she had made herself to get her through several months of hard work for her exams and today is the day she will collect. On this day of celebration as she had passed all her exams, she set off to buy the dress only to collapse in front of her neighbours. When she wakes up she is in hospital a few hours later, she receives bad news from the doctor, she has been poisoned and only has 24 hours to live. This leaves her the choice, wait in hospital to see if they can do anything to help her or leave to buy the green dress she had promised herself.

A short story covering the a brief moment in time of Betty’s life and tries to ask the reader the question of what would they do if they were in Betty’s situation. The setup is contrived, but it works in getting the point of the story across. It helps that the writing sketches out quickly what is happening, but this also carries across to the characters. As the main protagonist, Betty’s sole thought is around the dress and what it means to her, with everything else she worked for seemingly of no importance. If what she worked towards was of no importance, then why didn’t she just buy the dress straight away. The theme it is trying to push is about the control that Betty has over her life and wanting to meet it on her terms, but as Betty is only briefly sketched out, there is not enough to give any impact of this to the reader.

The writing style is basic with most of the sentences short and simplistic, which means there is little flow to the book and a lack of depth in the story. The spelling and grammar in the story need a little work, but the formatting of the book needs it more. There are no indents and it appears more as a solid wall of text instead of being broken out into readable parts.

It is an interesting story that may make you think about what you might do if you were in the same situation. But it lacks the impact that the question really deserves.