review: How It Ends

I've fallen in love. With a book. Its name is How It Ends and I just can't stop thinking about it. You know when you read a truly amazing book, you keep going over and over the plotline events and simply sit there, feeling utterly amazed at the intense connection you feel with the characters or story or whatever? Well, case in point.


How It Ends

Author: Laura Wiess
Publisher: MTV
Release Date: August 2009
Pages: 344

 All Hanna's wanted since sophomore year is Seth. She's gone out with other guys, even gained a rep for being a flirt, all the while hoping cool, guitar-playing Seth will choose her. Then she gets him -- but their relationship is hurtful, stormy and critical, not at all what Hanna thinks a perfect love should be. Bewildered by Seth's treatment of her and in need of understanding, Hanna decides to fulfill her school's community service requirement by spending time with Helen, her terminally ill neighbor, who she's turned to for comfort and wisdom throughout her life. But illness has changed Helen into someone Hanna hardly knows, and her home is not the refuge it once was. Feeling more alone than ever, Hanna gets drawn into an audiobook the older woman is listening to, a fierce, unsettling love story of passion, sacrifice, and devotion. Hanna's fascinated by the idea that such all-encompassing love can truly exist, and without her even realizing it, the story begins to change her.
Until the day when the story becomes all too real...and Hanna's world is spun off its axis by its shattering, irrevocable conclusion.


To me, a book distinguishes itself as the cream of the crop if it can make me cry. I don't think I've ever cried out of sheer happiness, so what I'm referring to are the tears that are elicited from a really tender and touching or else devastatingly heartwrenching moment. I wouldn't say this makes me a masochist, for wanting to have a book that can bring out a real good tearfest from me, I just think it's important for me to feel a connection with what I'm reading.

With that being said, Laura Wiess is the go-to author if you're prepared for a bonafide bawl-a-palooza. I can't quite describe it precisely, but Wiess just knows which parts of the book she needs to spell out for readers and which parts are fairly self-explanatory. One thing I strongly dislike about some books is how they assume the readers are dumb and need everything explained to them, as if we don't know what foreshadowing or metaphors are.

And truthfully, I don't think the blurb above does the book enough justice. It makes How It Ends sound a bit trite and unassuming, but seeing as how I've been raving about it this entire entry, I don't find that very accurate.

The character development is just wonderful, I have to say. The book is told both in first and third person. Weiss makes sure to clearly differentiate from Hanna and Helen, the two main characters. And when the storytelling came along, I felt myself being drawn into what was happening, insomuch that I could really familiarize myself with the events.

But seriously, you should pick up a copy of this for yourself. This review can't even hold a flame to How It Ends. Try it out, you might find yourself raving about it, too! :)