Library offers youth glimpse into death

“For everything there is a season, and a time for every matter under heaven: A time to be born and a time to die…” Ecclesiastes 3:1, 2

Human mortality is an inevitable fact that pervades every aspect of our existence, and is a topic that has been addressed by writers throughout history. Modern writers for teens have not shied away from any aspect of the subject as a recent selection of new young adult books from the Marion County Library shows.

Deadline by Chris Crutcher tells the heart-wringing story of Ben Wolf, a standout cross-country runner, who discovers during a routine physical that he has a rare and fatal blood disease and only a year to live. Because he is eighteen, Ben has the legal right to keep the news to himself until he’s ready to reveal it. With only his doctor and therapist in on his secret, Ben sets out to live an entire lifetime in a year: he ditches track for football so he can play alongside his brother, Cody, the team's star quarterback; he overcomes his nerves and asks out gorgeous volleyball player Dallas Suzuki; he challenges a narrow minded teacher by choosing as his civics project a petition to name a town street after Malcolm X; and he makes it his mission to help the town drunk whom he discovers has a very dark past.
After several months, Ben realizes that his decision to keep his health secret is more complicated than he first knew: by not revealing the truth, he's essentially lying to family and friends. With the help of “Hey-Soos,” a calm and thoughtful confidant who appears in Ben's dreams, both Ben and the reader can ponder about the meaning and worth of their own lives.

Kiriel, a demon or “fallen angel” has plenty of time to reflect on the meaning and worth of human lives as his eternal job in Hell is to mirror the self-loathing and regret of the souls of the damned back at them. Though he knows humanity’s innermost desires and fears, he has never experienced the pleasures (and pain) of physical sensations. In Repossessed by A. M. Jenkins, Kiriel decides to rectify this shortcoming and take a little vacation from his dreary duties at the same time by taking over the body of seventeen-year-old Shaun Simpson in the instant before the teen steps in front of a speeding cement mixer.
Over the course of his stolen seven days in Shaun’s body, Kiriel attempts to experience as much enjoyment as he can, from the brush of a cool breeze across his cheek, to the tangy sweetness of ketchup, to more personal sensations. However, though Kiriel never had a physical body before, he is not heartless. Because of Kiriel's experience in Hell, he decides to engineer a lasting positive impact on Shaun's loved ones and classmates. Kiriel gives Shaun's friendless little brother the name of someone he should get to know and plants a seed in Shaun's mother's head about reconciling with her estranged brother.
He helps a girl gain confidence in herself and confronts the school bully in hopes of making him realize the pain that he causes others. Jenkins writes with a wry sense of humor: Kiriel is warned that Hell is aware of his transgression by an instant message he receives on Shaun’s computer and his attempts to have a romantic liaison go hilariously awry. Because Kiriel himself questions a "Creator" whom he's never seen or heard from and because of his passion for all that life holds, he leaves a lasting impression on the reader.

Because Kiriel interrupted the trajectory of Shaun’s existence, Shaun is given a second chance at life. Other characters, in Dead Connections by Charlie Price, are not so lucky. When high school cheerleader Nikki vanishes from her small California town, only Murray Kiefer, a teenage loner who likes to sit in the cemetery and listen to what the dead have to say, can hear her anguished pleas for help.
Pearl, the opinionated and impulsive daughter of the cemetery caretaker, eventually befriends the withdrawn Murray and together they must face a series of disbelieving adults in order to find the answers: Deputy Gates, a good cop with a troubled past; Robert Barry Compton, an ex-con who witnessed the crime, but is hindered from revealing what he knows because of fear and mental illness; Janochek, Pearl’s understanding single father; and Billup, the bad cop too drunk on the night of Nikki’s disappearance to remember his actions.
Each fast-moving chapter is told from the point of view of one of the many characters. The different voices add to the puzzle, as each character follows his own path to solving the crime. What readers think they know is frequently challenged, and the resolution reinforces the fact that appearances can be deceiving.

Murray Kiefer from Dead Connections was so intent upon his role as a “ghost whisperer” that on his own tombstone he wanted engraved, “Friend to the Deceased." Bod Owens, the central character in Neil Gaiman’s The Graveyard Book, is more than just a friend to the dead — they raise him.
At the outset of the story, an adroit and unawares toddler evades the assassin who has just slain his entire family by climbing out of his crib, bumping down the stairs, and walking out the open door of his home to the cemetery up the street where he finds solace and safety among its various inhabitants including matronly Mistress Owens; ancient Roman Caius Pompeius; an opinionated young witch; a melodramatic hack poet; and Bod's beloved mentor and guardian, Silas, who is neither living nor dead and who has secrets of his own.
Growing up in this other-worldly setting leads to many adventures, from getting kidnapped by ghouls, to obtaining a headstone for the shunned young witch, to, most dangerous of all, attending school with other living children -- all of which prepare Bod for a final showdown with the murderer, who has never stopped hunting him. The ending is both triumphant and bittersweet as Bod must ultimately leave the graveyard and his loved ones to join the living, but he does so (thanks to their teachings) “with his eyes, and his heart, wide open.”

Open your eyes and heart to one of life’s great pleasures — reading — by checking out these titles and more at the Marion County Library.