Young Adult Fiction / Indigenous / Social Themes / Death, Grief, Bereavement / Epistolary (Letters & Diaries)
First-year college student Andy can’t afford to slow down. Study, volunteer, work, make new friends, fall in love — whatever it takes to keep her from obsessing over her brother Ally’s death, which was ruled suicide by overdose. Navigating a new life chapter without her “honorary twin,” Andy writes letters to him as she strives to embrace her bisexuality and her Indigenous identity. Once she discovers Ally’s hidden poems, Andy pours over them to make sense of her brother’s life — and his death.
Back in senior year, Ally dreamed of being a poet. His parents encouraged him to write as a hobby, but they always expected him to inherit the family-owned bookshop with his sister. Ally wrote to cope with his emptiness, until he turned to drugs to fill the void.
Reaching for her brother through unanswered words, Andy must reckon with living a once-shared life alone.