Thirteen Reasons Why by Jay Asher

Publisher: Razorbill
Source: Bought (Barnes and Noble)
Edition: Paperback
Pages: 327
Rating: B

Clay Jensen returns home from school to find a mysterious box with his name on it lying on his porch. Inside he discovers cassette tapes recorded by Hannah Baker–his classmate and crush–who committed suicide two weeks earlier.

On tape, Hannah explains that there are thirteen reasons why she decided to end her life. Clay is one of them. If he listens, he'll find out how he made the list.

I have been wanting this book for YEARS. I wouldn't be surprised to say that I've wanted this book since 2007, when it was published! I always told myself that I would wait for it to release in paperback because I'm such a cheapskate. Let me tell you... that took forever! But now that this lovely, powerful novel is finally released in paperback, I let myself buy it and indulge.

It took me at least 30-40 pages to really get into this book, but once I was at that point, there was no distracting me from devouring it. As you know from the synopsis of Thirteen Reasons Why, listed above, Hannah Baker gets the chance to tell her full story and the reasons why she committed suicide. The first few reasons seemed a bit minor and fixable... until the other reasons were unveiled. This girl just could not catch a break. I couldn't imagine going through everything Hannah did and remaining sane. As the novel went on, her reasons got much worse to the point where I couldn't even guess how much worse they could even get... but they always did.

However strange this may sound, I typically prefer reading novels with a female's POV. It's rare that I come across a novel I really enjoy with a male narrator although there have been cases: Harry Potter by J.K. Rowling, I Am the Messenger by Markus Zusak. And now, I can gladly add Thirteen Reasons Why to that small list. Even though a lot of the novel is narrated by Hannah from the tapes, I always enjoyed reading about Clay and what he was thinking. He was an absolute sweetheart that was really easy to sympathize with and I hope to read more novels with narrators similar to him.

While I really did enjoy this book, I think the hype it continually gets made it fall short in the slightest way. I was expecting to cry my eyes out during the whole novel which didn't happen, and I cry pretty easily! Even though the hype may have made this book fall a bit short for me, I still really enjoyed it and would recommend it to anyone looking for something gripping and haunting to read.