SuitabookUs in the Before and After
Jenny Valentine
- Reading
- Read in manageable sections and allow space to pause after emotionally difficult developments. Discuss the changing timeline and clues without revealing the ending, then revisit how the characters’ understanding develops.
- Themes
- Friendship and belonging: Elk and Mab form an unusually intense bond, while family relationships and other close connections shape Elk’s world. The central friendship is presented as powerful, meaningful and emotionally sustaining.
- Grief and coping: Characters face progressive illness and death, while Elk receives support from a grief counsellor and worried parents. The book examines how people cope, or fail to cope, with losing someone they love, without presenting grief as simple or uniform.
- Love, uncertainty and revelation: The story brings tentative first love and jealousy into a friendship already affected by secrets, an unreliable narrator and possible ghosts. The book leaves its stance open to more than one reading.
- Worth knowing
- The main point to consider is emotional readiness for bereavement: the story includes a grandmother’s progressive illness, a sudden death, counselling and intense grief. A first romance and jealousy add further emotional complexity.