This is Not a Love Letter

About this book

"A long beautiful heart-breaking love letter to potential and possibilities and hope to the pain we survive in youth and carry with us into adulthood."--NPR Book Reviews One week. Thats all Jessie said. A one-week break to get some perspective before graduation before she and her boyfriend Chris would have to make all the big scary decisions about their future -- decisions they had been fighting about for weeks. Then Chris vanishes. The police think hes run away but Jessie doesnt believe it. Chris is popular and good-looking about to head off to college on a full-ride baseball scholarship. And he disappeared while going for a run along the river -- the same place where some boys from the rival high school beat him up just three weeks ago. Chris is one of the only black kids in a depressed paper mill town and Jessie is terrified of what might have happened. As the police are spurred to reluctant action Jessie and others speak up about the harassment Chris experienced and the danger he could be in. But there are people in Jessies town who are infuriated by the suggestion that a boy like Chris would be a target of violence. They smear Chriss character and Jessie begins receiving frightening threats. Every Friday since they started dating Chris has written Jessie a love letter. Now Jessie is writing Chris a letter of her own to tell him everything thats happening while hes gone. As Jessie searches for answers she must face her fears her guilt and a past more complicated than she would like to admit.