Knee-Jerk

Th1rteen R3asons Why
Jay Asher
Read by Debra Wiseman and Joel Johnstone

This is a story that begs to be listened to since I read more than a handful of reviews from the blogosphere since last year. I know the basic premise: a girl commits suicide and then a box of tapes is sent to the thirteen people she blamed for that decision. That alone compels you to sit back and think; what would make a girl kill herself and blame thirteen people after the fact. You ask yourself why suicide? You try to contextualize vile behavior in those thirteen people but without knowing who they are, without reading their stories you're at a dead end withholding judgment. That alone would make you want to get hold of a copy considering the positively glowing reviews online.

I don't know what made me pick up the audiobook instead. Gut tells me it's better listened to than read and I was right. This from someone whose audiobook collection is basically nil. But going through the story in audiobook format is just perfect. Just perfect. Because you're basically hearing Hannah Baker's story as is, like she's talking to you and as if you're Clay Jensen listening to it from Tony's stolen Walkman. But I'm getting ahead of the story.

Clay Jensen is the main character and we hear the story from his and Hannah's points of view; his, because the story starts when he gets the box of tapes on his front door, Hannah's, because you're practically hearing the seven tapes she sent out.

Let's deal with the positives first.

I haven't read a lot of books on suicide and I think that it's a brave and serious topic to consider in telling a story that mirrors teenagers nowadays. And the story is truly compelling. It's like a punch that takes the breathe out of you, particularly that first moment when you hear Hannah's voice in your speaker and you sit dumbfounded like Clay Jensen in the tape's introduction. Asher gets it right, writing in the perfect tone of someone going through a very difficult time in their highschool life. You feel the anger, the confusion, and the rapt attention even. You're reeled in to Hannah's voice and you can't stop yourself.

I have to give kudos to the voices: Debra Wiseman and Joel Johnstone. They became Hannah and Clay. I had a picture of Hannah in my head talking to me. I had Clay traveling through town, going through the spots in Hannah's map. There's something about a spoken story that begs attention. Rapt attention. It would've been a different experience had I read this. There would've been some inflections in the tone, the pauses, some aspects in Hannah's telling that I probably would not have picked up.

But while the writing is perfect for the story and so is the telling, in the end I didn't like it and I'll tell you why.

I was waiting for Hannah's redemption to the very end of her suicide tapes and I didn't get it. She remained that self-centered, misguided, vengeful bitch she started with. And yes, I'm probably the only one who's going to tell you that. And she left thirteen people believing they had, one way or another, stuck a knife at her and let her bleed. To some aspect, figuratively, yes. Why redemption? I want to understand her, really. While I get what she has done, I don't understand her at all. Misguided, you see. And self-centered. Selfish? Probably. I mean who wouldn't want the world to revolve around their concerns in highschool, right? Who wouldn't want to connect? And I counter that with who wasn't a topic of rumors in highschool, whether true or not? Who wasn't hurt? Who didn't keep secrets? Who hasn't pretended way back then? Who wasn't insecure? Who wasn't bullied? Who wasn't ignored? Who wasn't left to pick up the pieces of one's broken self?

To me when the cd played its last notes I thought this isn't exactly about a suicide but about guilt. Knee-jerk guilt about all those teeny tiny things you thought you did wrong way back and now it all comes back to haunt you. That's not to say that we never did anything wrong at all. We all did (and I dare ask those who didn't to cast the first stone). It could've been as simple as rejecting someone or positively embarrassing them. Could've been worse.

I know what it feels like to want the world to revolve around you, for people around you to see you, understand you, believe in you, rescue you if you really want to. But the world doesn't turn that way. It turns and turns and turns unmindful of the fact that some people are jerks and some aren't. That some people are nice and some deserve to be skinned alive. That sometimes you're popular for the right reasons and at times for the wrong ones, and at times you're relegated to obscurity. And yet, highschool is that perfect place where you let words, thoughts, actions roll off you if you want to. It's that perfect place where you shut out voices that crumble whatever's left of your shaken soul. It's that perfect place to choose your battles and let slide others. It's that perfect place to take responsibility for your actions and learn from it.

Highschool is that complicated time of your life where everything is as raw as can be and yet you want to make your mark in it. It doesn't matter whether you're the prettiest girl in school or the nerdiest of nerds, the jock or the future president. You want to make a mark. You want to belong. You want to be understood. You want to connect.

But as in all things, just because you want it so doesn't mean it will happen. There are and will be jerks in this world who would make your life difficult. There are and will be pretend-friends who would sell your soul to the nearest bidder. But there are and will be people who look upon you with care and loving attention. There are and will be people out there waiting for a chance.

And Hannah sadly, never gave the world a chance.

One thing that riles me is that she never really took responsibility for her actions. Never. Up to the thirteenth person in the tape, the poor fellow she thought would save her from the act, I was shaking my head and thinking "Poor, poor guy." He didn't deserve that. He didn't deserve the tapes. And probably some of those included as well. Heck, nobody deserves those tapes at all.

And from the way she told her stories, she never really wanted help even if she recognized that she had a problem. Those who have given counsel before know that you can only help someone who wants it. Hannah didn't want help. If she did, she would've gone to that one person who would surely understand her. And no, not Clay. Not Tony. But Mrs. Bradley. There were no rules in school that would've prevented her from seeking Mrs. Bradley. Yet she didn't.

Hannah believes she's entitled to be heard even after death. This sense of entitlement arises from the blame game she concocted early on. But like I said, she's a misguided, self-centered, vengeful bitch. She doesn't deserve the airtime.

More than thirteen positively glowing reviews of the same book:

Becky's Book Reviews
Bookroom Reviews
Booktalks -- Quick and Simple
Debbie's World of Books
Em's Bookshelf
Epinions
Librarina: Great Books for Tweens & Teens
Out of the Blue
Reading Too Late
Revish
The Book Zombie
The Hidden Side of a Leaf
The Loud Librarian
The Story Siren
The Zen Leaf
Twenty Thousand Leagues
Young Adult Book Reviews