Week 22 Review: Playlist for the Dead

From Goodreads:
A teenage boy tries to understand his best friend's suicide by listening to the playlist of songs he left behind in this smart, voice-driven debut novel.

Here's what Sam knows: There was a party. There was a fight. The next morning, his best friend, Hayden, was dead. And all he left Sam was a playlist of songs, and a suicide note: For Sam—listen and you'll understand.

As he listens to song after song, Sam tries to face up to what happened the night Hayden killed himself. But it's only by taking out his earbuds and opening his eyes to the people around him that he will finally be able to piece together his best friend's story. And maybe have a chance to change his own.

Part mystery, part love story, and part coming-of-age tale in the vein of Stephen Chbosky's The Perks of Being a Wallflower and Tim Tharp's The Spectacular Now, Playlist for the Dead is an honest and gut-wrenching first novel about loss, rage, what it feels like to outgrow a friendship that's always defined you—and the struggle to redefine yourself. But above all, it's about finding hope when hope seems like the hardest thing to find.

My Review:
Oh, this book! It dealt with suicide, and being the one left behind, and it was a really compelling story! There was also this theme of how you can't really know somebody completely-they might have secrets, or different sides that they show to different people. Yeah. Really great to read!

What I really loved, was that we got a song off of the playlist for each chapter, and I listened to those songs when I was reading their chapters. Not music I've listened to, or will again, most likely, but it added a little something extra to reading this book, another connection!

These characters were not two-dimensional. They popped off the page, including some of the dislikeable characters-the bully group. They had their flaws, their reasons, and finding those things out was just really fantastic!

There was the party, and that was a mystery. We knew something bad had happened there, and that Sam felt guilty for what happened, which is why he was there and discovered Hayden dead. And then we found out what happened, and yeah, that was hard!

Loved reading this book, it was just so fantastic and real!

Author: Michelle Falkoff
Read: May 22nd, 2016
Source: Edelweiss
Reason Why: Another fantastic-sounding DAC Book, and a SAC 2016 Book! I just had to read it!
Publisher: Harper Teen
Published: January 27th 2015

5/5 Hearts

4.5/5 Books

5/5 Stars