This is it. The last review of my cannonball! And what a book I have chosen to go out on. A friend of mine, seeing on Goodreads that I was edging toward my reading goal for the year, reached out to me with some graphic novel suggestions that I could tackle quickly to get across the finish line. It was great to have her support, and her endorsement that graphic novels “do count” which, of course they do! One of her suggestions was the graphic adaption of the Diary of Anne Frank to which I had to confess to her that I had never read the original. Her response? ASHLIE ELIZABETH DAIGLE (not my middle name) and I mean, once you’ve been middle named, even fake middle named, you have a responsibility to follow through.
I was an English major, so how I made it through honors English classes and an English degree without having to be compelled to read it is a little suspect, but my journey to not read this book was deliberate. I started it many moons ago but knowing how it ended just couldn’t bring myself to read on. It was almost as if I thought that if I didn’t finish it, maybe it would turn out differently. Silly certainly, but so it was.
I am glad to have a catalyst to finally read this book. What can I say about one of the most reviewed books in history? What a gift it is to us to have such a compelling and authentic snapspot of this girls experience of a horrible atrocity and period in modern history. It is as wonderful and horrible as I suspected all along, for me the hardest part of reading it is how vibrant and delightful and truly alive she was. And to think that all those people, all those beautiful wonderful people, were ceremoniously needlessly and violently removed from existence is awful, but this book at least lets us get to know her so that she and all those others can be vividly remembered.