Beth Greenfield can certainly write. She is able to exorcise emotions from her early adolescence with both compassion for her young self and a relentless, brutal honesty. Readers may find solace in her deeply personal reactions to the death of her brother and friend as Greenfield struggles with anger towards her devastated mother. Recommended for readers of memoirs and for those seeking to cope with their own grief.

Here's a treat for fans of political satire, and for once the subject is not the United States government. Hanif has a great time with the political, cultural, and religious underpinnings of Pakistan. For the first half of the book I was entranced. But after a while it's like a joke that's maybe gone on a bit long. Still recommended for the right reader, however.

I read this in one sitting - it's just that compelling. At the same time, it was hard to reach the end of the book, since the narrator's death was so certain. It was also hard to read through all my tears! But it was a good kind of grief, the kind that calls to mind the real life experiences of losing loved ones to the slow ordeal of cancer. I found it to be exceptional in the juxtaposition of ordinary teen life with the threat of imminent death. Many teens like reading about death ala Lurlene McDaniel, and I think they will eat this more realistic portrayal up.