Personally, I never understood the power of having books written about your experience - whatever that experience may be - until I wrote one and started hearing from teens. I just got an email from a reader who said that "Thirteen Reasons Why" was the first time they had felt understood. A book shouldn't be anybody's first time feeling understood and that's where censorship bothers me. These books need to be out there.
Jay AsherAnd here he is again, yet things feel like they'll never be as easy between us as they once were.
Jay AsherA lot of authors see their book being banned or challenged as a badge of honor. But for me, it's nothing but frustrating and upsetting. I hear from readers that my work encouraged them to ask for help or reach out to someone about the situation they're in. When you hear stories like that on a daily basis and then hear adults call for your work to be banned, it's proof of why the stigma around these issues is so dangerous.
Jay AsherI decided to find out how people at school might react if one of the students never came back.
Jay AsherSometimes we have thoughts that even we don’t understand. Thoughts that aren’t even true—that aren’t really how we feel—but they’re running through our heads anyway because they’re interesting to think about. If you could hear other people’s thoughts, you’d overhear things that are true as well as things that are completely random. And you wouldn’t know one from the other. It’d drive you insane. What’s true? What’s not? A million ideas, but what do they mean?
Jay Asher