Hold Still by Nina LaCour

 I first published this review on June 13, 2010

Hold Still by Nina LaCour was hard for me to put down. It gives so much insight to the emotions following a teenage suicide. It approaches  this subject from the perspective of Ingrids best friend, Caitlin. LaCour did an excellent job of getting the reader to feel the pain that Caitlin feels after her best friend kills herself.

The book follows the year after Ingrids death.  Divided into four parts summer, fall, winter, spring. You can follow the 5 steps of grief :

1. denial
2. anger 
3. bargaining 
4. depression 
5. acceptance.

Caitlin goes back and forth in these steps - just like you or I would. - And even though she gets back into living her life, - acceptance of suicide is hard to ever attain - but Caitlin accepts the fact that she's still alive and understands this was not her fault.

It gives a bit of perspective on Caitlin's parents and how worried they are about how this  is affecting her. Being a parent, this was very interesting to me.  Even though the author didn't "say" how they were reacting - you could feel their reactions by the way Caitlin responded to them. 

I've really not read many books about suicide - especially teen suicide but for a book written for teens - it's very well done.

If I had teens left in my home, I would suggest this book to them. I would also suggest that parent's read it so they can discuss this subject with their teen. It would also be a good book for counselor's and youth workers.

Dealing with teen suicide is not easy by any means and I would NEVER pretend it was something that I am qualified to do. Years ago, a teen in the community where we lived committed suicide. Another youth minister in that same community told her friends that she would definitely not go to heaven because of killing herself. This was one of the worst things for these young people to be told.  The repercussions of his statement were not good and healing for these teens that were left came to a standstill for a much longer time than normal. Fortunately, I'm not the one that judges who goes to heaven and who does not and I would caution anyone making this judgment. God and God alone knows the heart. Let Him do what He does best.

As a Christian, I look at death differently than non-believers. This book is NOT written from a Christian perspective but it is still a book I would suggest.

Very well written.