Blog Tour | The Words We Keep by Erin Stewart | Top 5 Reasons to Read The Words We Keep

THE WORDS WE KEEP

Pages: 400

Genre: Young Adult Contemporary

Publishing Date: 15th March, 2022

Rating: ⭐⭐⭐⭐⭐ (I’d give more if I could)

Synopsis:

A beautifully realistic, relatable story about mental health and the healing powers of art–perfect for fans of Girl in Pieces and How it Feels to Float.

It’s been three months since The Night on the Bathroom Floor–when Lily found her older sister Alice hurting herself. Ever since then, Lily has been desperately trying to keep things together, for herself and for her family. But now Alice is coming home from her treatment program and it is becoming harder for Lily to ignore all of the feelings she’s been trying to outrun.

Enter Micah, a new student at school with a past of his own. He was in treatment with Alice and seems determined to get Lily to process not only Alice’s experience, but her own. Because Lily has secrets, too. Compulsions she can’t seem to let go of and thoughts she can’t drown out.

When Lily and Micah embark on an art project for school involving finding poetry in unexpected places, she realizes that it’s the words she’s been swallowing that desperately want to break through.

Author Info:

Erin Stewart is the author of SCARS LIKE WINGS, her debut novel. Erin is a graduate of the Medill School of Journalism at Northwestern and a BYU undergraduate who works as a freelance writer and editor, as well as a weekly columnist in Salt Lake City.

Erin lives in Utah with her husband and three children. She is represented by the amazing Rebecca Sherman of Writers House.

Author Links: Website | Twitter | Instagram | Goodreads

Thank you to TBR and Beyond Tours, Netgalley and the author for providing me with a free digital copy to review. This in no way, has influenced my thoughts on the book. You can check out the other posts on the tour here.

Top 5 Reasons to Read:

Realistic Characters:
First off, I just want to say that I literally don’t know where to start with this book, but characters seem like a good place so we start there.
The characters were amazing. Lily is a legitimate favourite of mine. To be honest, I could see myself in her, she was the extreme version of me. And I rarely like characters who are like me, and that’s how I knew that the author has done a wonderful job on the book.
Micah, Sam and Margot were also amazingly portrayed!
A novel on mental health:
I don’t know about you, ~~but I am feeling 22~~, but I love me a good mental health novel. And this was one. It deals with suicidal thoughts, OCD, depression and so much more. It shows us that all of us are broken in a way, but we can help each other be less broken with love and compassion.
Portrayal of stigma around mental health:
A lot of the books that discuss mental health, forget this aspect of mental health. Everyone around the main character (who’s mentally unwell) is perfect and no one teases or bullies them for being the way they are. But in this novel, the stigma of mental health is also portrayed and I loved that about it.
Poetry:
As you may have realised after reading the synopsis, this novel has poetry. Now I didn’t think that the author would actually include the pieces of poetry, but she did, and boy did it hard. As a poet myself, I know a good poem when I see one, and all the pieces of poetry in this novel, are just absolutely strong and empowering and amazing.
Three-dimensional writing style:
I mean this sort of comes in the poetry point, but I simply had to give the writing style a shout out. I had to. It is amazing.

Sadly, this is where I stop raving about this novel. But. Guys. Read. It. Now. Please. It’s for the good of you, okay? Go read it!! Here’s my review if you wanna see it. I just rave about it more, but oh well.

Will you read this novel (Please do)? Have you already? Let me know in the comments!