thirteenreasonswhy

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Thirteen Reasons Why

Jay Asher

Asher, Jay. Thirteen Reasons Why. Penguin Group. New York, New York. 2007.

Thirteen Reasons Why is written by the author Jay Asher. It is a book based on a true story and it is about a girl named Melissa who had a normal life, until her mom was diagnosed with cancer. Jay Asher hasn’t received an award for this book yet.

Thirteen Reason Why begins with Melissa returning from her mother’s funeral. Her mother was diagnosed with cancer five years ago, when Melissa was only ten years old. Back then, she didn’t really understand what cancer was, but she had a faded memory of her mom losing her hair each day. Now she sat on her bed crying for what seemed like hours, until her little brother, Mike, walked in. They both stared at each other in complete silence, as there was nothing to say. They had lost the most important person in their lives, aside from their father who had passed away three years ago because of a car accident. Now, they would have to move from Georgia to Nevada, where their aunt lived.

A few weeks after Melissa and her brother had made their big move to Nevada, Melissa received a small package in the mail. It didn’t have a return address, but it had her full name and her new address clearly written on it. Her mind was filling up with curiosity. Inside was thirteen torn pages out of her mom’s diary. Melissa wasn’t sure how someone had gotten a hold of it, since Melissa had the dairy. Melissa had never looked in the dairy, because she knew that her mom had had it for a reason, and it wasn’t something for her to read. As much as Melissa wanted to read the thirteen pages of her mother’s diary, she wasn’t going to let herself do it. The next day, Melissa couldn’t help looking at the open package on the floor of her new bedroom. Curiosity took over her and she read every single one of the thirteen pages, and she couldn’t believe what she was reading.You could guess what happened next.

Melissa couldn’t think anything else but “Why?” Why would her very own mother would do these things, to her self, to her friends, and to her family?

Thirteen Reasons Why is a book based on true a story that has touched many readers’ hearts. It is very mysterious, although it is very easy to misinterpret what’s going on. Jay Asher did an acceptable job with this book but, the reader would be more drawn in if he had added a little bit more emotion.

4 out of 5 stars

Contributed by M. Gebremariam

May 22, 2013