mockingbird was a difficult book to read. Caitlin’s elder brother, Devon was killed in a school shouting; her father was working through his grief and mightn’t be able to support her. Compounded by her Asperger’s, she was struggling to make sense of her newfound desolate reality.

Kathryn Erskine wrote this in the first person narrative - all the better for me to crawl under Caitlin’s skin and feel the world from her perspective. Having heard of the word ‘Closure’, she set off on a quest to find it. She finally decided on finishing Devon’s chest, a project meant for his Eagle Scouts endeavour. She might have singlehandedly saved her dad from the brink of depression. Her dad was understandably resistant toward the idea of completing the chest, but he eventually came around to it because Caitlin was the personification of persistence.

This, combined with her making friends with Michael, another victims of the shooting and Joss, the school bully, made it a very satisfying story arc to follow. Throughout the process, she grasped the concept of empathy. She felt bad for Devon because he wouldn’t be able to live life anymore. Which goes to show that glimmers of positivity still remain amidst a dark-streaked landscape.

I liked this way better than “The Curious Incident of the Dog in the Nighttime”.