The Last Time We Say Goodbye

The Last Time We Say Goodbye

by Cynthia Hand

Genre: Young Adult Fiction

Synopsis: There's death all around us.  We just don't pay attention.  Until we do.

The last time Lex was happy, it was before.  When she had a family that was whole.  A boyfriend she loved.  Friends who didn't look at her like she might break down at any moment.

Now she's just the girl whose brother killed himself.  And it feels like that's all she'll ever be.

As Lex starts to put her life back together, she tries to block out what happened the night Tyler died.  But there's a secret she hasn't told anyone-a text Tyler sent that could have changed everything.

Lex's brother is gone.  But Lex is about to discover that a ghost doesn't have to be real to keep you from moving on.

from the book jacket

Review:  I definitely need to move onto happier books!  This book started to blend in with all the books about death and disease that I've read this summer.  I liked how we were able to see Lex go through stages of grief from denial to acceptance.  She seemed overly mature at some points of this book and then not quite so mature at other times, especially with her father and her therapist and for the most part these extremes fit because she needed to be stronger for some people than for others.  Sometimes young adult fiction books don't seem young adult at all and other times I feel like I'm not the right audience for the book.  I don't think I was the right audience for this book.  I enjoyed reading the story but I just didn't love it.  I thought it was well written for a teenage audience but not necessarily for adults.

Rating: 3.5 stars