Letters of loneliness, love and loss

The novel consists of letters and each tells a story, but combines to form a bigger picture.
Letters of loneliness, love and loss

Laurel’s English teacher gives the class an assignment: write a letter to a dead person. Initially reluctant Laurel gives it a shot, and then in no time, she turns around the assignment and finds herself writing to many dead people, including Amy Winehouse, Kurt Cobain and Judy Garland.

What starts as an English assignment by Mrs Buster, becomes Laurel’s life. Each chapter is written as a letter to another person, which reminds me of Every Day by David Levithan. The book is special in its own way as it’s a lot more than a bunch of letters and deals with sibling loss. Each letter tells a story, but combines in the form of a bigger picture.

Laurel is a high school freshman, whose beloved and apparently perfect older sister, May, died some months back in mysterious circumstances. Though Laurel was the only witness to May’s death, she is unable to say what happened. The only place she can express herself is a notebook where she writes letters to dead celebrities. “Dear Kurt Cobain”; “Dear Judy Garland”; “Dear Amy Winehouse.”

“There are some things that I can’t tell anyone, except the people who aren’t here anymore,” she writes. The idea of having someone start with a school assignment and then opening up and finding comfort in it is a wonderful idea in itself. Sure, stuff like this has been done before but the book truly takes you to an emotional whirlwind. And I won’t be surprised if the book is made into a movie sometime soon.

The author portrays the pangs of loss of a dear one so well that it shows that Ava has either experienced sibling loss or has done good research. Her themes ring true—the way younger survivors feel lost without the map of their older sibling’s precedent; the sense of being abandoned by their grieving parents; and the identity crisis that can come when the person they defined themselves as and looked up to is gone.

The book is, however, not without flaws. Laurel’s letters are a little too articulate for even an eloquent teenager. And it also makes you go slightly down at points, because it reaches into you and pulls about at your emotions, so if you like happy books, a lot of this might not be for you. But if you can handle some tear-jerking emotion, then this book should be on your must-read list.

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