Love You Hate You Miss You

By Elizabeth Scott

This novel is in the top five of my favorite books of all time. It is recommended for sixth grade and up; however, in my opinion, it should be for at least seventh or eighth grade. It is an easy book to read but I do not think some of the content is appropriate for upper elementary students. The lead character, Amy, is a sixteen-year-old who lives with her mother and father who are still so sickly in love that they do not seem to notice their daughter spinning out of control. She has taken up drinking at parties that she goes to with her best friend, Julia. Julia has a boyfriend, Kevin who is known to be a bad guy at their high school. Amy is sick of her best friend being betrayed by Kevin. One night at a party she decides to plan for Julia to catch Kevin being unfaithful . To her surprise, Julia does not break up with him, but is completely traumatized. Julia ends up driving away from the party, with Amy as a passenger, and crashing the car. Amy survives, but her bff Julia does not. You do not find out any of this information until the very end. The process of getting tidbits of information at one time is what kept this book on the edge of my seat. From the start, all you know is that Amy has a friend from high school who passes away and she misses her a lot. The book is split up into two different parts; one part is letters to Julia and the other is a personal narrative, all in Amy's perspective. She goes through the mourning process that coincides with the title of loving her best friend, hating her for dying, and missing her beyond belief. Amy also has to deal with the enormous feeling of guilt that, although she was not driving, she was the reason Julia was driving so careless. Reading about how Amy goes through picking up the pieces of her life again was an emotional roller coaster. The written letters are incredible--I do not usually cry for movies or books but I definitely cried when reading this book!