Review: The Catastrophic History of You and Me

The Catastrophic History of You and Me gives a new spin to the popular vow ''till dead do us part.''

After, Brie dies from a broken heart (heart failure) she arrives in limbo where she must go through five steps to enter the afterlife: denial, anger, bargaining, sadness, and acceptance. Or so Patrick, a boy from the 80's who is keen on helping, tells her. But once Brie learns that anger means going back and getting even with the boy who broke her heart, she gets a bit too carried away. Why move on at all? And if Patrick says that is the best thing to do, then why is he still in limbo after so many years?

At 375 pages, the book felt quite lengthy compared to other contemporary stories, but author Jess Rothenberg did an incredible job utilizing the space and providing us with a journey through the human emotion of loss. Brie was overly talkative at first; mostly filled with rage over being dumped and seeing so many people at her funeral, who never even payed her attention while she was alive. Discovering how her family and true friends coped with things brought tears to my eyes. And definitely made me appreciate life even more.