Playlist for the Dead

by Michelle Falkoff

[Leah]

Harper Teen are by far my favourite publisher on Netgalley/Edelweiss. I am auto-approved for them and they regularly add new batches of novels to Edelweiss for my perusal, and one such novel that caught my eye was Playlist For The Dead. I thought it sounded like a very interesting novel, with a very serious subject matter. The premise reminded me a bit of 13 Reasons Why (which I haven’t actually read, but I think everyone knows what it’s about, right?) and I was very curious what had caused Hayden to kill himself.

Playlist For The Dead has one of the easiest premises I’ve ever read, but it’s actually a very, very complicated novel – for most of the novel I was as frustrated as lead character Sam when it came to trying to get answers about what lead to Hayden’s suicide. It was fruitless for most of the novel with only Hayden’s cryptic message and his playlist to go by. It was quite the tale to unravel, and it wasn’t simple, either.

whatiloved

Sam was a very captivating narrator. I could feel his sadness and his confusion over Hayden’s death, I could sense his frustration as he tried to figure out what happened, his sense of helplessness. I’ve thankfully never known anyone who has killed themselves, but I know it would torment me if I did. Day and night, as it did Sam and I felt so sympathetic to him as he was the one left behind.

I was also really struck by his affinity with Astrid. Astrid was a fantastic girl, I loved her sense of style, I loved that she changed her hair and her clothes on a daily basis and she wasn’t afraid to be who she really wanted to be (although the thing that caused her to act this way was, again, a very sad event). Throughout the whole novel there’s this sense of sadness, and everywhere you turn there’s someone unhappy, and it was quite tough to take, but that just made it all the more powerful.

Probably the thing that I liked the most was the dual mystery of unwrapping Hayden’s suicide and finding out who was exacting revenge on the bully “trifecta” who had plagued Sam and Hayden up until Hayden’s suicide. I was curious to see who was the person getting revenge on these bullies, who very much deserved what they got (in my eyes, anyway).

thenotsogood

I have to confess that I finished the novel feeling like I still had questions that needed answering. There’s a lot made of Hayden’s playlist and how it’s super important to his death, but I never felt we got a clear or concise answer about that. Though it’s hard to say that because truly the only person who knew why he killed himself was Hayden, and he was dead, and most certainly couldn’t answer that question himself.

I was also a little bit sad at the ending. I’m a happy-ever-after kinda girl and I would have liked Sam to have forgiven Astrid for what she did, because they were just so awesome together.

verdict

Playlist For The Dead was a fascinating, absorbing novel. It wasn’t a happy novel, it was a haunting, sad novel, filled with expected misery everywhere you looked. But it was an eye-opener, and just goes to show that suicide doesn’t just affect the person who dies, it affects everyone around them, and the blame game is inevitable. It was a very strong novel, one that will most definitely speak to a lot of people, and despite it’s subject matter, I am glad I read it. I feel more aware of the subject now, considering my past feelings on the subject of suicide.