Death is a scary reality that we all must face. Unfortunately, many times, people decide to take their own lives. This is most popular among teenagers. In Innocence, Jane Mendelsohn tells the story of a girl who is growing up around pain, suffering, and suicide.
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The story's main character is Beckett. She is a teenager growing up in New York City with her father. Her mother died while she was a baby. Her father is an alcoholic and does not support her emotionally. The only person she considers family is her boyfriend, Tobey. She even comes close to losing him. He is attacked in a coffee shop bathroom and is put in a coma for a few months. .
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Her boyfriend's close encounter with death was the cause of her first close encounter with death. On page 92, she considers suicide for the first time. She felt as if the whole world was against her and there was no reason to continue her life any further. One morning while getting ready for another day of torment at school, she notices a razor in her house. Considering all of the pain she had recently been through, she picks it up and ponders. She gets flashbacks of the incident with Tobey and decides that the right thing to do is kill herself. Just as she is about to press the razor to her wrist, her father walks in the room. She inconspicuously puts the razor in her pocket and leaves for school. The whole day is a mental war for her, contemplating on whether or not to go through with it. Eventually, with some help from friends, she decides not to, and to try to find other ways to cope with her feelings. .
In 1996, more teenagers and young adults died of suicide than from cancer, heart disease, AIDS, birth defects, stroke, pneumonia and influenza, and chronic lung disease combined. It is also the third-leading cause of death among those aged 15 to 24 years (www.nami.org). .
