Analyzing Hannah Baker's 13 Reasons Why

Jay Asher, author of 13 Reasons Why summarizes Hannah Baker’s first year of high school. He takes us through her ups and down, and how the one person that gives her hope let her down. Jay Asher really makes the reader feel like Hannah is talking directly to you with emotion and emptiness. The author uses tone in order to build a mood. Jay Asher does this by representing the depression in many ways. He sets up the book to show that Hannah could have a good day and then the next day could be horrible, because that’s how depression works. Sometimes authors hide symbols and really make you hunt for them. That just happened to be the case with this one. There were various little hints, but it wasn’t a direct symbol. Each tape was numbered and labeled in blue nail polish, on the last day that Hannah saw clay/day of her life she was wearing the same blue nail polish. Clay had no idea that was the last time he'd see Hannah. She had already recorded and mailed the tapes. Hannah had already made her final decision, even if things went well that day she had already sent out the tapes. Because she uses blue nail polish to number the tapes with …show more content…
He doesn’t start with the worst story and progressively get better. He shows how when you have depression you can have good days some days and horrible the next. It’s not a consistent bad day and after bad day. This is important because it makes the reader understand depression and what Hannah is going through. The author also uses incredible word choice to increase the emotions and terror she goes through. For example instead of saying “You got into the car” he said “You opened the passenger door, sat down, and buckled up”. Another thing that helps is that the whole book is mostly just Hannah talking through the tapes and Clay listening and responding occasionally. It feels like You’re reading the tapes, or Hannah is talking directly to