Jay Asher
288 pg., U.S. Paperback
Penguin
5/5 Stars
Hannah Baker seems like she would be one of those girls who has it all, and maybe that was the true. From the outside. On the inside, Hannah Baker was torn apart by lies, love, and loneliness. She kills herself, but makes thirteen recorded cassette tapes to explain why she did it beforehand. She mails the tapes out, and Clay Jensen receives them. He listens to each tape, reliving Hannah's worst memories and discovering why she took her life.
Thirteen Reasons Why is not for the faint of heart. It is heart-wrenching, saddening, and also injects anger into the reader's heart and soul. I read this book not only because it was my school's book club book of the month, but because I've been wanting to read it for months, but just hadn't got my hands on it. Now that I have, this book is inching its way up my favorites. It has that same characterization as My Sister's Keeper, but it's not as tear-inducing as that one. Each tape is sort of inter-connected with others, and many different events need to stay in your mind in order to fully understand Hannah's meaning behind committing suicide.
The one thing I didn't like about the book is how unlikeable many of the characters are. I know that that's the way it is in real life with kids at Hannah's age, but there was just something about the way that Hannah described them that I didn't like. There was that moment of realization where you peer through Hannah's curtain to see her reasoning, but I won't spoil that for you.
Thirteen Reasons Why is a standalone novel. Jay Asher has teamed up with Carolyn Mackler to write The Future of Us, a story of 90s teens who discover Facebook. That one is released November 21st of this year.
