I won this from somewhere, and it was great! I will probably read Walsh's other stuff when I get around to it . . . ( )

Read this book for 52 Weeks 52 Books 2014.10. Read on my kindle with whisper sync.

After the death of their mother, Olivia and Jazz set out to make the trip their mother could not bring herself to take. Their journey becomes a way not only to deal and accept the death of their mother but to find each other. They are on a journey one willing and sure this is the right thing to do the other heels dug in believes the trip is nothing more than a flight of fancy.

I found many wonderful passages that spoke to me throughout the book, here are just a few of my favorites:

pg 4 "If you live your whole life hoping and dreaming the wrong things, what does that mean about your whole life?"

pg 24 "It was okay to believe in things that others didn't believe in. It was okay not to believe, too.

pg 43 :You should always think about what you say before you say it, always mean what you do before you do it. Always be sure of yourself, and consider the repercussions."

pg 222 "Maybe wishing made it less likely that we'd try to make things come true on our own. Maybe wishing made something inside us go lax."

Very enjoyable read!

pg 268 "Maybe I wasn't so stuck. All those prisoners stayed put, after all, when they could've run. Because they were safe where they were, or because leaving was a risk." ( )

There was a bittersweet sadness to this book. It's about loss, death and moving to the stages of grief. In one way or another.

Oliva is 18, Jazz 22. Their mother just killed herself. Their father started drinking. Olivia can smell colors and stuff, and has blinded herself looking at the sun. Jazz, thinks she is the only normal one. They are now a messed up family who can't bare to deal with the loss.

The story is told with flashbacks and with the story of course moving forward. It's also told in a letters their mother wrote. The book is about a journey Olivia sets out on, to get her mother's ashes to a special place her mother never dared to go. And Jazz goes after her.

They move through their sorrow, they get angry, they find closure. The journey also take a darker turn, who can you really trust? Something is hidden in the shadows and we get that story too.

I enjoyed this book, and I liked how it showed grief, and love. ( )

I received an early copy of this book...and kept picking it up and putting it back down again. I finally finished it today. The book follows two sisters, Jazz and Olivia, who are polar opposites. Their mother recently died in what looks like a suicide and the sisters and their father are reeling from guilt. Jazz and Olivia go on a journey to visit a place that their mother always wanted to go to but never did. Over the course of the journey, we learn about Beth (their mother) through letters that she wrote to her father but never sent. Things happen and the sisters learn to understand each other better.

The story itself was fine. I didn't really care for either of the sisters for nearly 2/3 of the book. The character of Hobbs kept me interested in moving forward with the story. The story of his past seemed out of place in this book but, since I liked his character, I was okay with it. Not a bad book, just not one for me. ( )

A beautifully written story of a family, particularly two very different sisters, dealing with death. After their mother's apparent suicide, Jazz and Olivia grieve in their own ways, each reflecting what kind of relationship they had with their mother. When Jazz gets dragged along on her sister's pilgrimage to see the "wisps" in the West Virginia bogs, the sisters meet new people and eventually come to terms with each other. The novel was well written and kept me interested. There were quite a few dynamics going on to enrich and explain why each girl is the way she is, enough to make their unpleasant behavior make sense within the context of the story. I loved how the story was layered, bringing in different perspectives and documents to give a well rounded view of the situations. ( )