Part of Me Died Too: Stories of Creative Survival Among Bereaved Children and Teenagers
Although the author directly addresses young readers, this unusually perceptive and sensitive book can be shelved with confidence alongside adult titles about bereavement and death. Fry, an artist and bereavement counselor at a hospice in Vermont, presents 10 graceful studies of children and teenagers in mourning, progressing from the experience of a toddler preoccupied and puzzled by the death of a family dog, to a 13-year-old girl's reactions to the accidental death of her mother, to the complex situation of a girl who protected herself and her small brother as her father killed first her mother, then himself. Fry's compassion and her admiration of her young subjects shine through the sadness of these accounts; to each of the 10 chapters she appends a short list of "creative survival strategies" that outline journal exercises and other projects to help channel grief. An epilogue visits each of the mourners some years after their losses, thus implicitly demonstrating to the reader that sorrow can indeed be surmounted. Adults will find much of interest in Fry's discussions of the particularities of children's responses to death; young mourners and their peers will be moved and fortified by Fry's thoughtfulness and honesty. Illustrated with drawings by bereaved children. Ages 10-up.Copyright 1995 Reed Business Information, Inc.