engaging and interesting
Melody Carlson is a much loved young-adult fiction author and on this evidence, it is easy to see why. Writing a book about teen suicide sounds like a difficult task as the theme can be dark, finding the right words can be challenging and confronting the reality and fallout can seem almost taboo.
The central character, Morgan is a quite wonderful and partly vulnerable character whose life is surrounded by equally flawed but very human and recognisable fragile friends and family, including a well portrayed drug addict brother and a ?cradle-robbing mother?. But the book?s opening chill comes when her best friend Jason, an intelligent, humorous and perfect youth with everything to live for takes his own life.
Like nearly all suicides, it is a shock to his community and the individuals within. What seems a greater shock to our narrator Morgan is that while Jason was a patient listener and insightful sounding board to others, she was not there to listen when he needed her most. The tone of this book is set perfectly between the roller-coaster of denial that this could ever happen to the jolt of acceptance that it has. What is striking perhaps is that the reader almost physically identifies with the characters portrayed ? you might find yourself physically reacting at parts of the story as Morgan goes through her cycle of emotions.
This is a story told honestly and with hope. It is a convincing narrative with the dialogue, action and references found in teen novels. What marks it as different is a wonderful grasp of what teenagers say and what goes unspoken in informal understandings. For the reader, this novel might seem like a difficult journey but also a real confrontation with the reality of a life beyond this and of the claims of the one Friend that will never leave us or forsake us.
Engaging. Outstanding. Exemplary.
