"My Heart and Other Black Holes" by Jasmine Warga

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Warga, J. My Heart and Other Black Holes. New York, NY: Balzer + Bray, 2015. Print. ISBN: 9780062324672. Hardcover. $17.99

Annotation: Aysel’s life revolves around planning her death, specifically with the help of a web site called Suicide Partners, which lets people pair up to hold each other accountable for the deed. But when a boy named Roman messages her, asking her to partner up, she has no idea that their alliance might just wind up making her reconsider if there might be some things worth living for.  

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Sixteen-year-old Aysel is planning her suicide. But to make sure she doesn’t wimp out at the last minute, she’s found a web site called Suicide Partners, which lets people pair up and hold each other accountable. A boy named Roman messages her and asks her to partner up, and at first she’s hesitant, because he’s nothing like what she expected him to be. He’s the opposite of her: athletic, popular, good-looking, with a family who adores him. But he’s as torn up by tragedy as she is, and she slowly begins to trust him.

Unfortunately, or fortunately, depending on how you look at it, as they plot out the details of their suicide, they begin to fill the voids in each others’ lives. Hazel starts to wonder if maybe there might be some things about life that are worth hanging on for, and maybe her heart isn’t such a black hole after all…

Literary Awards:

• Spring 2015 IndieNext List Selection
• Huffington Post's List of Most Anticipated 2015 YA Debuts
• Huffington Post's YA Books of February 2015
• Goodreads Best Books of the Month, February 2015
• PopSugar's Best Books of February 2015
• Chicago Tribune YA roundup, Spring 2015
• Bustle's List of Most Anticipated 2015 YA Novels
• PopCrush's List of Most Anticipated 2015 YA Novels
• Barnes & Noble 15 YA Books That Get It Right
• CBC's "Hot Off The Press" January 2015 List
• LitReactor's List of of 14 Highly Anticipated YA Novels
• Sugarscape's List of 15 Anticipated YA Novels

"I really couldn't predict where this was going. Like, I kept thinking, one of them is going to die, but which one? There's no way they're both going to go through with it. This is going to be so sad. But I definitely wouldn't have guessed the way she was going to end it! That's why I liked it so much. I like that it's real, and that it kept you guessing." - Chris, age 16

 Listen to an interview with author Jasmine Warga: