"I want to fall on the sidewalk right there and drag myself into the ivy.": Jay Asher

Thirteen Reasons Why (Amazon) by Jay Asher took me forever to get through. I don't even want to write a blog entry about it at this point. However, I will soldier on through.

Thirteen Reasons Why is about a girl (Hannah Baker) who commits suicide. Before she dies she records tapes, which are directed at certain people, explaining how they played a part in their suicide. They are only intended to be listened to by the people on the tapes, but if they don't pass the tapes on to whoever they're supposed to, the tapes will be released publicly. Honestly, I think that in itself is rather horrible. But then some of her reasons are so petty... it left me rather frustrated with her.

The book is narrated by one of the people who receives the tapes. I won't give away why he's on the tapes... but when I finally found out, I was pretty annoyed. I don't like the narration style either-it jumps between the tapes and the narrator, and sometimes it gets a little confusing. Maybe that's because I was reading quickly, trying to get through the book.

Honestly, I'm glad I can't find contact information for Jay Asher. However, there is one thing I want to say in this book's favor: it appears to have had a positive impact on many people's lives. If you go to http://13rwproject.com, you'll find a ton of people who loved this book. What can I say? Maybe I just didn't get it.

See you next time!

Let's Talk About Independent Bookstores

Hello everyone! I apologize for my absence. I've been fairly busy. Right now I'm in the middle of two books. One is Thirteen Reasons Why by Jay Asher and the other is Bikini Planet by David S. Garnett. They are two very different books.

However, today I wanted to talk for a little bit about used & independent bookstores. Over the weekend, I went to an awesome book store in Cleveland. It's called Mac's Backs and their website is here. If you're in the area you should totally check it out. I got all 6 books you see to the left for about 15 dollars. It was pretty awesome.

Anyway, I don't particularly like to preach, but I just wanted to encourage everyone to support their local independent bookstores. Clearly, the bigger bookstores are having trouble-imagine how it is for smaller bookstores. They're definitely not easy to find, at least where I am. I'm going to be honest: I order almost everything off of Amazon. I only shop at Barnes & Noble and Borders when I have a gift card. However, I do like to pop into used bookstores whenever I spot them. You never know what you might find! I just discovered that Bikini Planet was only released in the UK.

Okay, that wraps up my preaching. Hopefully I finish something to write about soon. I'm not exactly loving Thirteen Reasons Why, so it's a bit of a struggle. We'll see though! Have a great day!

Author Reply: Jane Linskold

I got a quick reply from Jane Linskold, author of Brother to Dragons, Companion to Owls. She said she still loves her novel and the original Betwixt and Between (the main character's dragon stuffed animal) has a "place of honor" in her office.

In other news, I've read a few graphic novels lately, though all by more known authors. However, I think they're worth making a post about, next time I don't have anything to post about. Some books on my To Be Read list include:
Snow Flower and The Secret Fan by Lisa See
Thirteen Reasons Why by Jay Asher
City of Dreaming Books by Walter Moers
and a ton more. So we'll see what I get to next! See you tomorrow!