A big reason why I loved Please Ignore Vera Dietz was becaue of the main character-Vera. She endured an incredibly traumatic event in her life and she just held on even when everyone would have understood if she fell apart. She inspired me in the fact that I find personal strength an extremely attractive quality and me, myself, would love to have more of. Vera suffered a few very impactive things throughout the book. The first one is that her mother left her and her father when Vera was 10. Her mother left them for a wealthier man and never really contacted them. She sent Vera $50 dollars on her birthday every year- a cheap excuse for having a girl grow up without a mother. This obviously had affected her growing up. She was left with feelings of being completely unwanted and unloved. Early in Vera's life, Vera's mother had to become a stripper in order to make finanicial ends meet. A reoccuring theme throughout the novel is how strongly Vera felt about becoming nothing like her mom. She was constantly afraid of falling into the same path her mother fell into. So there was the first one. Secondly, Charlie. Charlie gave Vera enough trouble when he was alive. He ditched her in high school and as soon as she started feeling okay about losing him in the sense of him just changing, he would show back up in her life only to let her down again almost instantly. This is hard enough for a teenage girl to deal with-losing her best friend due to high school changes and loving him in silence. He quiet frankly played with her heart. Then, of course, the big one- Charlie dying. He already hurt her enough while alive and then he decides to die-as Vera's attitude was- and leave her with all these daunting questions. He is no longer there at all to answer anything--so Vera is left with the unknown about everything Charlie was into and what Charlie was feeling and doing. Then, lastly, she develops this...condition...after Charlie dies. She hallucinates that at times, thousands of Charlie's are suffocating her asking her to clear his name. She is too mad at Charlie to do this right away, so the Charlie's don't leave her alone for a long time. They come at the same times Charlie did- right when she starts feeling better. In fact, since the novel changes narrators, some chapters include dead Charlie's opinion on things. He says he sends these things on purpose because he knows and wants Vera to clear his name since he obviously can't. But anways, Vera is very scared of these Charlie's appearing and she becomes extrememly frustrated with them.
So that is an overview of how strong Vera Dietz HAD to be in order to overcome all these obstacles in her life. I know that I already have a heard enough time balancing my school-work-soccer-social life schedule. I recently got in a car crash and have been dealing with the consequences of that which include a lawsuit against me. And I know one of the hardest things I deal with is boys and heartache. After reading this book, it made me think about how much worse it could be. My boyfriend could be dead. I could be living only with my father with no mother figure and no siblings (I love my brother). I could be having mental problems as an after effect of all that has happened to me. I could feel like I am destined to be absolutely nothing when really, I have an incredibly bright future with much less darkness than Vera's. Therefore, I really became attached to Vera's character and how she carried herself. It made me appreciate what I do have. At for that, A.S. King, I thank you very much.
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