Heart to Heart: Someone's loss, Is someone's new beginning (Spoiler alert)

This week I started a new book and it’s called Heart to Heart by Lurlene McDaniel, it captured my eye when I looked at its cover/size of the book and when I read the blurb it made me want to read it more. So far in the book I’ve learned that there are 2 main characters and that Lurlene McDaniel wrote this book using 2 different points of views.

One of the character’s name is Kassey and in the beginning of the book she introduces her best friend and her name is Elowyn Eden. She goes on to talk about how they met, how close they were and the key events leading up to a devastating event that killed Elowyn. Kassey was already devastated about her death until she found out that Elowyn had checked a box on her license saying to be an organ donor.

“Elowyn Eden and I became best friends. We met the summer before we were going into seventh grade…” (p.3)

“Her name was Elowyn Eden. She was my best friend. She died when she was 16 years old.” (p.47)

These 2 lines stood out to me as I read the book because the first line started the book and the second ended the first part of the book. It was like (metaphorically) a close and end to a friendship and life. This made me think to myself how to appreciate my friends more because one day they might be there for you all happy and the next day they might be gone.

The other character was introduced in the second part of the book and her name was Arabeth. She was a girl that had lost her father to a war in Afghanistan and has a sick heart and needed a heart transplant. She didn’t have friends because she had to move a lot since her father was a Sargent, but after his death her heart got worst and couldn’t go outside much or to school. There was a false alarm before (when the heart wasn’t a match), but now there was a heart that was a match to her.

“My nail beds were bright pink, not blue as they had been for years. Tears welled up. The new heart was pumping blood to my fingertips, to every cell in my body. I was alive.” (p.55)

This line from the book described how grateful she was after the heart transplant. The part where she said she felt alive was the word that stood out to me because it’s like saying before she felt as if she was dead or had no freedom, now  she can do things like she could do before her heart got sick.