Title: 13 Reasons Why
Author: Jay Asher
Publisher: Razorbill (ctober 17, 2009)
MSRP (Hardback, USA): $16.99
Pages: 320
Summary: You can't stop the future. You can't rewind the past. The only way to learn the secret... is to press play.
Clay Jensen doesn't want anything to do with the tapes Hannah Baker made. Hannah is dead. Her secrets should be buried with her.
The Hannah's voice tells Clay that his name is on her tapes- and that he is, in some way, responsible for her death.
All through the night, Clay keeps listening. He follows Hannah's recorded words throughout his small town...
...and what he discovers will change his life forever.
********************************************
I was originally going to do this review as a list of 13 reasons why I loved Th1rteen R3easons Why... but once I tried I saw I loved too much about it to list.
Mainly what I loved so much was the writing- Hannah's voice, regularly flowing throughout the novel, was so sad and earnest. You could tell she had tried so hard- well, thought she had tried- to get help, and was giving up, defeated and beaten down. But even then, she was still sweet, funny and totally likeable. When I first started reading the book, that was something new to me, and basically up until the end my eyes were wet. Another thing about the writing I loved was how Hannah's recordings were constantly sprinkled throughout the story- for the record, the one in the italics. The most of a break you got was 2, and most of the time it was just a sentence or two from Clay. At first, that frustrated me- I'd get so into Hannah's story, wondering and waiting and listening along, that I'd entirely forget about what Clay was doing. Someone would speak to him, Hannah would continue a bit, Clay would respond to said person, I'd have no clue what he was talking about. But it's something I got used to fairly easily.
It was such a good idea on Asher's part to use cassette tapes, in my opinion- it seemed more mysterious and personal than had it been something like CD's.
Speaking of it's mystery, the book really wasn't predictable. I was wondering what every single person had done, what had driven Hannah to her breaking point. And I definitely didn't know what to expect from Clay.
Finally, the characters- even though very few characters made an appearance in the novel, you get to know all the people- Hannah ans her 12 other "reasons"- so much better just by seeing what effect they had on Hannah and what she thought of them, including Clay.
A true page turner- I got so mad whenever I had to be torn away from it. I accidentally missed my bus stop on my way home because I was reading it- it's something worthy of you TBR pile.
