TH1RTEEN R3ASONS WHY

Rating:	★★★★★
Category:	Books
Genre:	Teens
Author:	Jay Asher

Thirteen Reasons Why. Huh? What? Aren't you curious what these reasons are all about? Intriguing title, isn't it? I never knew that such a novel exists, and I never expected that I would invest my precious time reading a masterpice of an author I've never even heard before. But I simply just wanna satisfy the GG (xoxo, haha) side of me, that's why I checked on the first page just to know what it is all about, and then the second page, and then the next one, until I realized that the time I finished a chapter, the more I was interested on proceeding to the next.

What's the novel all about? Say hello to Clay Jensen, the ninth reason why. Tadahhhh! Clay received a box addressed to him one afternoon, with seven CASSETTE tapes inside it. These audiotapes were recorded by Hannah Baker (Clay's classmate) before she comitted a suicide. (So you might have guessed by now that the complete title of the book should be THE THIRTEEN REASONS WHY HANNAH BAKER KILLED HERSELF. Haha) The audiotapes said it all about the life of Hannah before she ended her life, and how these thirteen person somehow affected her decision. Each of the thirteen had a side of a cassette tape dedicated to him/her. Sent to the first person that started it all, Hannah gave only two rules to the LUCKY 13. Rule number one: Listen to tapes. Rule number two: Pass it to the next person involved.

Who are the other twelve persons?
Why are they on Hannah Baker's list?
What happened to Clay after listening to the tapes?
So I think that's the rest of the things you'll know after you read the novel.

I am contented on how the novel is written. Though centered on Clay Jensen's point-of-view, I love the idea of putting Hannah Baker's point-of-view through the cassette tapes. The story? Interesting enough. Not only that the whole book is a mystery, but each chapter is fascinating. And of course, I love the meaning beyond the words. The ideas and lessons presented by the novel, I don't know if intentionally or unintentionally, that were applicable to the real world. My favorite is the idea of snowball effect. I just think that I didn't know some characters that much. I don't know. But I think something is incomplete on how the characters are presented. But overall, I think the novel is good. A must-read!

--some of my favorite quotes from the novel-- (apparently all said by Hannah Baker)
* Because it may seem like a small role now, but it matters. In the end, everything matters.
* Things get better, or worse, depending on your point of view.
* Stupid? Yes. But did it make sense? Yes...at the time.
* I guess that's the point of it all. 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.
* Sometimes we have thoughts that even we don't understand. Thoughts that aren't even true--that aren't really how we feel--but they're running through our heads anyway because they're interesting to think about.
* If you could hear other people's thoughts, you'd overhear things that are true as well as things that are completely random. And you wouldn't know one from the other. It'd drive you insane. What's true? What's not? A million ideas, but what do they mean?
* If you hear a song that makes you cry and you don't want to cry anymore, you don't listen to that song anymore.
* You don't know what goes on in anyone's life but your own.
* And when you mess with one part of a person's life, you're not messing with just that part. Unfortunately, you can't be that precise and selective. When you mess with one part of a person's life, you're messing with their entire life.
* Everything...affects everything.
* You can't go back to how things were. How you thought they were. All you really have...is now.
* I could have stopped it--end of story. But to stop it, I felt like I'd have to stop the entire world from spinning. Like things had been out of control for so long that whatever I did hardly mattered anymore.
* The signs were all there, all over, for anyone willing to notice.