My Heart and Other Black Holes by Jasmine Warga

My Heart and Other Black Holes by Jasmine Warga
Buy My Heart and Other Black Holes by Jasmine Warga at Amazon.co.uk or Amazon.com
Category: Teens
Reviewer: Zoe Morris
Summary: When life is unbearable, Aysel feels she only has one option left in this heart-wrenching tale of teen suicide
Buy? Yes	Borrow? Yes
Pages: 256	Date: February 2015
Publisher: Hodder Paperbacks
ISBN: 978-1444791532
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Aysel lives in the middle of nowhere. She’s smart but not popular, so high school’s not much fun, and her part-time job, cold calling the town’s residents on behalf of various customers, is far from satisfying. It’s understandable that she’s not a very happy girl. She’s not the preppy cheerleader or the honour roll student who sidelines as class president. She’s nobody, really. But she’s nobody with a dark secret. She wants to take her own life, and she’s making plans to make this happen.

I often find teenage fiction handles deep subjects as well as, if not better than, adult books and this is no exception. It’s a book about depression and teen suicide, not to mention family trauma, blended families and more. It’s also one of the most gripping stories I’ve read in a long time. Aysel has very distinct and, in her mind, logical reasons for wanting her life to end. She sees something in herself, something that she feels can never change, and it scares her. When she meets Roman on an online forum, she finds in him a kindred spirit, and though she can’t really relate to what he’s gone through, she respects it and can empathise with his anguish. The two form a pact, but as Aysel grows to know more about Roman, she worries they won’t both be able to keep their parts of the bargain.

It’s hard to describe characters sometimes – you can state simply that someone’s depressed but unless you can make the reader feel their pain, they’re likely to lack empathy for them. In contrast, I don’t think the word ‘depression’ is ever really used in this book. It’s not a condition Aysel recognises in herself, though she does talk about a dark slug inside that throws a black film over every feeling, every event, every interaction. Some might wonder why their parents don’t realise how bad things have got, but to give Aysel’s mother her due, as time passes she does start to get concerned about her oldest daughter. Some might also wonder how likely it is that someone could be so unwell, emotionally, to the point that they were suicidal, and not have a doctor looking after them. In an odd coincidence, part of my job involves collating and analysing suicide statistics, which tells me that only about ¼ of deaths by suicide occur in those under the care of mental health services. That’s a lot of people out there hurting, like Aysel, but not seeking support to deal with the pain.

And so, back to the book. There are only two ways this can end, really. In a story about suicide either you do or you don’t. Of course when Roman enters the picture this adds another dimension. I didn’t know how the book would finish and the last few pages were a bit like the old game of chicken, hurtling towards an inevitable conclusion unless something drastic happens.

This is a book that, inevitably, will leave you thinking. I was surprised that I didn’t really like Aysel. Not because she wasn’t a well-developed character but because she wasn’t my kind of person. I think it’s ok to say that, and it didn’t mean I wasn’t feeling her pain throughout because no matter what your thoughts on someone, you don’t want them to go through what she’s going through. The writing was powerful and sucked me right in, and I had to keep reading in the hope that if I did she would be rescued, though knowing at the same time that that was unlikely to happen, and to some extent would be a cop out if she was.

I would highly recommend this book whatever your age, and I hope it finds its way into the right hands because there are some important messages to take from it, around decisions that can’t be undone if you wait too long.

Thanks go to the publishers for supplying this book.

For more on this subject, see Thirteen Reasons Why by Jay Asher

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You can read more book reviews or buy My Heart and Other Black Holes by Jasmine Warga at Amazon.co.uk Amazon currently charges £2.99 for standard delivery for orders under £20, over which delivery is free.
You can read more book reviews or buy My Heart and Other Black Holes by Jasmine Warga at Amazon.com.

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