Thirteen Reasons Why by Jay Asher
Published by the Penguin Book
Originally published in 2007
-Stylized as TH1RTEEN R3ASONS WHY
Synopsis:
Clay Jensen doesn't want anything to do with the tapes Hannah Baker made. Hannah is dead. Her secrets should be buried with her.
Then Hannah's voice tell 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 changes his life forever.
Review:
As a reader this book took me into a world of sadness, yet as a human being, it opened my eyes into the perspective of the hurting. The story follows many gloomy and heart-breaking events that take you to a person's death. I read this book with the audio for the tapes she sent and it just gave the book so much more realism because I felt the emotion behind the voice in the recording (I'll leave the link to the YouTube playlist containing the full audios of the tapes/the best one I found).
Although, it was a bit sad and it also made me cry in some parts, it gave me much more hope as I got to the end. Knowing that Hannah Baker died, the things that led to her death and how people were so oblivious to what happened to her... It made me think, there might be something positive to take out of it, or at least that was what I intended to find while I was reading. Of course, death is not something we find positive things in, but I still wanted to look at it from a different perspective. While reading, the only thing I could think of was how death is a part of life and just the simple mention of it in a deep meaning, it can actually give life to something. Things like sadness, sorrow and anger can arise from a word such as death, but also love and compassion to those that are affected by it.
Stopping on the philosophical thinking and not-at-all-mind-blowing facts, I really enjoyed the book. The font was what it was supposed to be, simple, yet clear and enhancing the parts that required more concentration. The cover though, it's grayish form gave spirit to its melancholic theme, yet I felt it was missing something in the background, like the other covers, because my copy left me hanging. The story was portrayed in such a wonderful matter and it really surprised me to know who the author was, since I had not really read anything by him before. The author, oh man, for being his first novel, I was astonished to such a brilliant piece of work.
This book will soon have a mini-series on Netflix, starting on March 31st, and I am super excited for what they have for it. I hope you get to read the book first and fill yourself with all the information needed for watching the show afterwards.
Quotes:
“No one knows for certain how much impact they have on the lives of other people. Oftentimes, we have no clue. Yet we push it just the same.”
“A lot of you cared, just not enough.”
“But you can't get away from yourself. You can't decide not to see yourself anymore. You can't decide to turn off the noise in your head.”
“A flood of emotions rushes into me. Pain and anger. Sadness and pity. But most surprising of all, hope.”
“You can hear rumors. But you can't know them.”
“Sometimes we have thoughts that even we don't understand.”
“It's hard to be disappointed when what you expected turns out to be true.”
Resources and more:
Audio Tapes - YouTube "Era Reads"
Basic Information - Wikipedia
Quotes - Highlighted and GoodReads