Stork surprised me with this one. I loved his first book, Marcelo in the Real World. Even in the difficult moments of that book, I often found myself smiling, appreciating the main characters' actions and words. So when I saw Stork authored this one, I grabbed it up. Once I started reading, I could hardly put it down. I loved this one too but for totally different reasons.
The Memory of Light begins with a teenage girl waking up in a pysch ward, realizing she should be dead. Her plan did not work, and she was stuck with the very difficult work of figuring out what and whom to live for. Stork explores the hows and whys, letting us readers meander meaningfully through her brain as she unpacks and reframes her life, eventually growing beyond the desperation and loss instilled in her suicide attempt. What makes this story different for me is that Stork uses personal experiences to write this story from, and as someone who struggles with depression, I both resonated with his character development as well as his intimate unpacking of each characters' way in life.
If you are looking for a happy spring-break type of YA novel, you might want to wait to read this book. If you want to dig into a book with a real-life, figuring-out-life YA novel with some difficult and crucial inner explorations, The Memory of Light can sit at the top of your to-read stack.
