Two or Three Things I Forgot to Tell YOu

Gr 8 Up–Katrina Olivia Traumer, known to everyone as Tink, entered the lives of the students at Quaker Heights Day School in their junior year, but by the next year she was gone, dead. Merissa, Hannah, Chloe, and Nadia do not understand why she took her own life. Each girl has a secret that she doesn’t want to share: perfect Merissa cuts herself and “slut” Nadia is in love with one of their teachers. Was Tink really dying of leukemia, or was there some other horrifying event that caused her to end her life? Just like her friends, readers never learn her true secret. This is a hard story to read. The girls are not very likable, and they aren’t very nice to one another. They live in an affluent New Jersey suburb of New York City and attend an exclusive private school. They are privileged but also extremely whiny. As the book opens, readers find out that Merissa has been accepted early decision to Brown University. This is a quite a coup, but she is miserable. There is some drinking and sexual content. Jay Asher’s Thirteen Reasons Why (Penguin, 2007) or Patricia McCormick’s Cut (Front Street, 2000) address the issues of suicide and cutting much more effectively.–Elizabeth Kahn, Patrick F. Taylor Science & Technology Academy, Jefferson, LA