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" Will they want to stay if they see the wounds and hear all the words I keep? "

The words we keep tell us the story of a young girl ( Lily) that is trying to handle everything in her life. After seeing her sister hurting herself on the Bathroom Floor, she is constantly struggling to understand what is going on in her mind.

Mental illness is not pretty, it is exhausting and raw. I believe anyone who has ever felt the pressure to be perfect or has fears of letting other people down, will be able to connect and relate with Lily. I supose her story is one that needs to be told, as there are so many teens who are on the same path and will find solidarity in her struggles.

I see Lily's pain completely: she pushes herself too hard to be the exemplary daughter after her sister's bipolar disorder shakes the entire family to the core. She acts like everything is all right as she falls into pieces, fighting with her own inner demons. Because she tries so hard to be perfect, she forget how important her mental health is. But, she is lucky and when she becomes partners with Micah for English project, she realizes she has found the only person who can truly understand what she's been through.

This book is absolutely gorgeous. It help us to understand more about the people who are brave enough to fight against mental health issues. Also, The words we keep, makes us see the difficulties felt by those in Lily's situation and urges us to support those who are facing such problems.

You say
I am beautiful
I am enough

With my flaws
my monsters
my scars

You see them
- all of them -
and stay.

And so do I.

Lily Larkin ~ Enough ~

☆☆☆☆

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“Words matter, in fact. They’re not pointless, as you’ve suggested. If they were pointless, then they couldn’t start revolutions and they wouldn’t change history. If they were just words, we wouldn’t write songs or listen to them. We wouldn’t beg to be read to as kids. If they were just words, then stories wouldn’t have been around since before we could write. We wouldn’t have learned to write. If they were just words, people wouldn’t fall in love because of them, feel bad because of them, ache because of them, and stop aching because of them.”

Words in Deep Blue is a book about love and grief, it’s a love story and not just between people but for books. It follows the life of Henry and Rachel, who used to be best friends until Rachel moved away.

Henry is working in his dad’s bookstore – Howling Books. He is struggling to find a way to win Amy back, his ex-girlfriend, and to keep his family together. His mother wants to sell the bookstore but, Henry’s Dad does not agree with it, and as a result, his family is falling apart.

Similar to this, Rachel returns in Henry’s town and moves in with her aunt. Her aunt gets her a job of cataloging in the same bookshop owned by Henry’s family. But what no one know, is the loss that Rachel suffered. She is trying to recover from his brother’s death that made her family to fall into pieces.

What makes Howling Books so special is “The Letter Library” a section in the bookshop where books aren’t for sale. People can read there and leave the books on the shelves. They also can write messages for one another, circle specific quotes, write in the margins, and leave a letter for the other to find, especially for the people they love.

As Henry and Rachel start working side by side, surrounded by letters and words of love, they begin finding each other and opening up to one another. So, Howling Books becomes the place where they learn how to heal from heartbreaks and losses.

Beautiful and moving, Words in deep blue remind its readers of the power of letter writing and words that convey the most powerful emotions one is feeling.

"The broken heart. You think you will die, but you just keep living, day after day after terrible day."  ~ from Great Expectations by Dickens (mentioned by Henry's dad)

☆☆☆

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“Death happens. We need to accept that and look around and appreciate what we have and change what we don’t like.”

You’d be Home now is a beautiful book about addiction, parenting, bonding, friendship. It shows us the unique bonding between Emory and his brother Joey and how they succeed to overcome all the difficulties in their lives.

After the tragic accident in Emmy’s small town, her life changed forever: her brother seems to be an addict and Candy, a popular girl from her high school, lost her life because of her brother and his best friend.

Emory is always doing what her parents told her, obedient, the good daughter of the family, while her big sister is the beauty queen at high school and her brother is the rebellious one getting full attention from parents with his addiction problem. But, Emory needs to be seen, to be cared for and to be listened too. She feels invisible since nobody sees her invisible scars.

On the other hand, she sees her brother’s struggle. Emory loves him and wants to make him the way he was before the accident. She has to help him but how can she help a person who doesn’t want to get help?

The story reminds you that it is impossible to be perfect: parents can’t be perfect and they can’t raise perfect kids. Parents will also make mistakes and they can’t direct their children’s lives by putting restrictions and controlling the choices they make.

You’d be home now shows us how addiction touches everyone and everything in its orbit: siblings, parents, friends, community. It is about wanting to keep someone safe even if the only thing you have is love. Thus, Emory becomes the image of a fighter who tries to keep her family together.

“How glorious it is to drown.”

Please come home

I miss you
I love you
Come back

Please come back home

☆☆☆☆☆

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“I know what you're thinking--if you hate it so much and it's such a burden, just lose the weight, and then that job will go away. But I'm comfortable where I am. I may lose more weight. I may not. But why should what I weigh impact other people? I mean, unless I'm sitting on them, who cares?”

Libby Strout was once America's Fattest Teen, whose house had to be cut open to allow her to be taken to the hospital. After three years of weight loss and counseling, Libby's returning to school. She is feeling confident and brave, and ready to show the world who Libby Strout really is. But her high school peers aren't as welcoming as they could be.

She received hate mail both while she lay in hospital and when she got home. Everybody wanted to tell her what they thought of her and no one asked her why she ate so much. But Libby is just absolutely amazing. She takes a stand against bullying and fat-shaming in such an incredible way. She doesn’t allow herself to be affected by the malice of the people around her and begins to accept herself as she is.

Jack Masselin is the big man on campus. The life of the party, Jack hides the truth about himself: he can't recognize faces due to a condition known as prosopagnosia—he doesn't even recognize himself except by his Afro. He goes through life putting on a front to try and keep his condition under wraps, but each and every day at school is a struggle when he can't be sure who is who.

When Jack grabs Libby in a cruel “game” called Fat Girl Rodeo, she punches him in the mouth, and they both wind up in group counseling. Spending time together will inspire each of them to become stronger, and slowly a kind of friendship develops.  Neither of them are perfect, neither are as honest as they could be, and things aren't always wonderful. But they each give each other something they have never had before: someone to rely on.

Holding Up the Universe is a story about finding courage when you feel you don't have any, and not letting anyone sway you from what you want. It's also a book about letting people see who you really are, and admitting when you need help. Holding Up the Universe, through Libby and Jack, helps us to understand that we should love ourselves the way we are and not to change just to please people around us.

“Remember this: YOU ARE WANTED. Big, small, short, pretty, plain, friendly, shy. Don’t let anyone tell you otherwise, not even yourself.

Especially not yourself.”

☆☆☆☆

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"It is sad, of course, to forget.
But it is a lonely thing, to be forgotten.
To remember when no one else does.”

This book is about Addie LaRue, a French girl who was born in the 1700s. She was always warned not to pray to the gods who answer when it gets dark. But on a desperate night, she does it and she gets an answer. Addie ends up making a pact with the devil: now she will live forever, but she will be forgotten by everyone. Until one day, 300 years later, a boy says the words that change everything: I remember you.

It’s a unique story about a village girl’s true demand for her independence who wants to make choices about her own life. She doesn’t want to be someone’s wife and somebody’s mother. So, she prays for the old gods and new gods but nobody answered her prayers but somebody heard.

Anyone she meets forgets her a few seconds later. That was the punishment the evil she called Luc gave her. She cannot even tell her name and write it anywhere. Only the devil can call her name.

So Adeline shortens her name as Addie and starts her epic adventure, witnessing the world’s history, mostly spending her time in European countries, seeing the French Revolution, world wars, artistic, political, social economic movements and awakening of the cities. She loved, she suffered, she was neglected, abandoned, abused. She lived like a fugitive in people’s houses, learning to be a skilled thief.

But her biggest strength is her stubbornness because, no matter how lonely she is, how she witnesses the people she fell for treating her like a stranger each time she meets them again, she learns from experiences. And she is wise enough to become unforgettable by living her thumb prints to the many art masterpieces from the drawings to the songs, books. She enjoyed the art and she was talented enough to leave her trace. That’s the real essence of immortality she contributed to the changing world.

But 300 years of solitude and loneliness end when she stops by the bookstore. Henry, the owner of the store, is feeling too much, suffering from a broken heart and melancholia looking for something but as like the song he still hasn’t found what he’s looking for. Till he sees the girl tries to trick him by stealing books and he remembers her name.

Even though Addie is lonely, cursed, abandoned, she has strong willpower, tough and fearless because she never regrets the life she has lived. This book is about history taking shape, about stories and ideas taking root in unseen places. It’s about life and art and humans and how, even after one hundred years or three hundred years, there is yet more to find. Unknowns to see. Novelties to discover. And it is all the more memorable because of it.

“Art is about ideas. And ideas are wilder than memories. They’re like weeds, always finding their way up.”

☆☆☆☆