Love Letters to the Dead illustrates the importance in self-expression

Nearly everyone faces the challenge of their first day of high school. But for Laurel, just waking up and getting through the day is enough of a challenge, besides the fact that she is starting high school at a place where she knows no one. However, knowing no one at her new school is a relief because she does not want to run into anyone who knows May, her dead older sister. At the end of Laurel’s eighth grade year, May died in an accident that remains a mystery to the reader until the end of the book. Laurel’s parents are divorced, and her mother has left Laurel with her father and aunt in Arizona to go chase her acting dreams in California. Laurel decides to go to a school outside of her district to try to escape the never ending inquiries about May’s death.

On her first day of high school, Laurel is given an English assignment to write a letter to a dead person. Laurel decides to write her letter to the Nirvana lead singer Kurt Cobain who was idolized by her sister. Kurt Cobain died young, just like May did. Laurel writes about May and her splintering family. However, when the bell rings, Laurel does not turn the assignment in because she does not want her teacher to know the personal details of her life. But Laurel keeps writing letters in her own time. The story of Laurel’s freshman year continues with each letter to a famous dead person being the equivalent of the chapter in a book. The reader gains insight on Laurel’s thoughts but is constantly left guessing how May died.

May means the world to Laurel. Laurel was awed by May’s daring yet dangerous behavior when May was alive. May was the girl that everyone turned their eyes to when she walked into the room. Their mother always told May that she was the reason for her parents’ staying together. Whenever their parents would fight, May would get up and dance to try to divert their attention and to make them forget they were fighting. However, two years before May’s death, her mother left her father. Laurel adored May, but as May grew older and entered high school, she started going out more and partying every weekend to cope with her parents’ divorce. May would take Laurel out occasionally on Friday nights for movie nights during Laurel’s eighth grade year. Laurel loved these nights because they were the only times she got to see May. She was happy to be shown a glimpse of May’s spontaneous and wild life. After one movie night, May and Laurel were just hanging out, and May died right before Laurel’s eyes. After May’s death, Laurel’s mother is distraught and makes her move to California.

Laurel continues to write letters to people like Amy Winehouse and Judy Garland. She writes about the adventures of her high school life: meeting new friends, falling in love for the first time, experiencing peer pressure and dealing with her depression and anger about May’s death and absent mother. Through Laurel’s letters, the reader learns that Laurel feels unrelenting guilt about May’s death. Laurel was there when May died, but she refuses to admit to anyone what happened. Laurel’s obsession with May’s death consumes her life and interferes with her relationships.

As Laurel reveals more and more in her letters about her shocking and unfortunate past and May’s death, she becomes enraged. She writes angrily to Kurt Cobain, demanding to know why he could be so selfish to commit suicide and leave behind his family. Her relationship with her boyfriend Sky becomes rocky because of her destructive behavior that she learned from her sister May. Laurel begins to question the importance of her life.

Laurel’s mother comes home around the end of her freshman year, and Laurel is unable to restrain her understandable anger towards her mother. In a public outburst, Laurel admits the secret of her broken past and the burden she feels about May’s death. The cause of May’s death is finally revealed to the reader.

Through her continued writing of the letters, Laurel is able to come to terms with May’s death and her broken family. She realizes that her beloved sister was beautiful, but she was also tragically flawed. Laurel must write about the truth of what happened to her sister and herself, so she can accept May’s death. She recognizes the terrifying brevity of life, but she realizes something even more important that makes the book a worthy read. We are all alive, and our lives do matter.