Finished In Honor by Jessi Kirby. (You can read her blog here.)
Honor’s brother Finn was killed in action and, on the day of his funeral, she opens his last letter to her. Inside is a note full of all the things you’d want to hear in someone’s last message to you, a surprise and a request. The surprise: two tickets to see her favorite singer in concert. The request: tell said singer about her (Honor’s) “handsome older brother.”
Honor decides spur of the moment to do it. The only hitch? The extra ticket ends up going to Rusty, Finn’s best friend…well, before they had a huge fight and Rusty started drinking. A lot.
I completely loved Moonglass (Jessi Kirby’s first book) and so when I saw that she was releasing a new book, I immediately preordered it for my Kindle. Like Moonglass, this book deals with grief but it isn’t a Sad Book. (You know the type, the ones where you know that every sentence is designed to break your heart and then wring it over and over and then, just for fun and because it can, grind the piees into the ground. This is not that book.)
Honor is obviously devastated at Finn’s death (and at being the last member of her immediate family; their parents died when she and Finn were little) but she’s also trying to keep going and so this road trip came at the perfect time. Yes, it’s a chance to do something for him, but it’s also a way to do something fun and not just sit there and think about Finn.
The fact that she’s with Rusty both helps and hurts, because he’s someone who knew and loved Finn too, someone who knew him as well as she did (and probably better in some ways, because you discuss things more easily with your best friend than with your little sister). But it’s also hard because it makes it even more obvious that Finn’s not there.
This is such a fantastic book (as is Moonglass). Highly recommended.
