The Astonishing Color of After
"Leigh Chen Sanders is absolutely certain about one thing: When her mother died by suicide, she turned into a bird. Leigh travels to Taiwan to meet her grandparents for the first time. There, she is determined to find her mother, the bird. In her search, she winds up chasing after ghosts, uncovering family secrets, and forging a new relationship with her grandparents. And as she grieves, she must try to reconcile the fact that on the same day she kissed her best friend and crush, her mother was taking her own life."
The Astonishing Color of After by Emily X.R. Pan took me a painstakingly long time to finish. Having lost my mother in a similar fashion, I thought that I could find solace and understanding in these pages. However, it was still incredibly painful to read. I related a lot to Leigh Chen, and that was the pain of it.
Seeing someone struggle throughout the years and having it surmount to a huge, painful, traumatic event that ends their life is no fucking joke. I liked that this novel doesn't try to find the answer or search for a quest to place the blame. Leigh's mother is depicted as someone who struggled for a very long time with her own demons.
Leigh just takes a spiritual journey through her cultural past to understand more about her mother's life. This side of the book was a little relieving, like it didn't have to be all doom and gloom. The dead, in this world, never truly leave us. Leigh's mother just had too much pain for her earthly body to bear. This book was a companion of mine through several months of grief. When nobody else had the words or the true empathy, this did for me. Thank you Emily X.R. Pan.