I feel incredibly grateful to have received an advanced copy of The Astonishing Color of After in exchange for my honest, unbiased opinion. Thank you to the publisher, author, and NetGalley, for allowing me to review. This is one of my most favorite books ever. I can’t wait to buy my own copy!

The Astonishing Color of After is a freeing, haunting, quirky, contemporary romance novel about depression, suicide, grief, family secrets, forgiveness, and love. This story takes place in America and Taiwan. Told with luxuriant writing, I wish I could share some of my favorite passages, however because this is an advance copy I’m not allowed. The writing quality is exquisite.

Leigh, the main character, is a girl who thinks of every life event as a color, yet only sketches in black and white. Leigh’s best friend is a guy named Axel, who creates pictures using colors and shapes to match the song in his head, then he makes the music to match the image. He calls it opera electronica. And yes, he is as cool as he sounds. Though Leigh has a secret crush on Axel, this is not an insta-love situation. Her other close friend, Caro, is a lesbian with a super quirky, loving family. Caro’s grandparents are absolutely adorable, and definitely a couple of my favorite characters.

When Leigh travels to Taiwan we get to meet her grandparents. As Leigh travels around Taiwan, visiting her mother’s favorite places, we get to learn a lot about the food and places. Feng is a close family friend who accompanies Leigh during her travels, teaching her more about the traditions and language. In her room at her grandparents place, Leigh finds some very dark sticks of incense. Burning each incense stick transports Leigh to a world of “Smoke & Memories” where she gets to relive moments of the past from her loved ones perspective. Flashbacks can sometimes be annoying, however these “Smoke & Memories” chapters are absolutely fantastic. Leigh’s mother always wore a cicada necklace, and I was curious about what the symbolism was for this. I learned that the cicada is a symbol of immortality or rebirth, which fits perfectly.

I appreciate how much time and careful consideration it must have taken to create a narrative centered on suicide in such an authentic and gracious manner. I smiled, I laughed, I cried tears of sadness and joy. I even got goosebumps many times reading the last 15% of this magical tale. I can’t recommend this one enough – 5 STARS!

While the book was well written, I had a hard time getting into it and never really did. I kept wanting there to be more to the magic/fantasy side of the story where her mother was actually a bird. I realize the author was going for something more spiritual and an exploration of grief and depression, but I just found it too depressing and it dragged on in many places.

Leigh Chen Sanders returns home on day to find that her mother has committed suicide. While in mourning a giant red bird shows up and Leigh instantly believes that the bird is her mother who wants her to remember . . . something. When a mysterious box containing mementos from her mom shows up at her home, Leigh and her father travel to Taiwan to the grandparents Leigh has never met. It turns out that Leigh's parents have been keeping secrets and now she must travel to places her mother liked to complete her mission. The only problems? Nobody believes her and she's only got a few days to complete the task. The Astonishing Color of After takes a deep look at depression, cultural identity, and family ties. A stroll down memory lane is an understatement.

I'm going to be honest, The Astonishing Color of After is everything I wanted The Night Parade and Our Father Who Art in a Tree: A Novel to be. Leigh's journey and her discovery of Taiwanese culture had a richness to it that made the book immersive. It was really interesting to see Leigh handle her mother's death, teenage life, and navigate a new country all at the same time. The memories are of several different time periods, POVs, and settings. Leigh's sense of being an "other" no matter where she was is omnipresent throughout the narrative.

This book was a quick read. The chapters are really short and the "action" consistent. I read this in a few hours and never wanted to put it down. My only complaint was that I couldn't connect to many of the side characters. They felt fleshed out but a little too "plot convenient" at times. It's really easy to ignore though. If I could have half stars, I would say 4.5/5 stars.

Beautiful debut with strong potential. Touches on important details and gives a unique point of view as well as a great perspective. Fresh and different, even if sometimes the writing didn't quite deliver on the intention. Strong 3.5 for me and I am curious to see what the author brings next.

This is a very emotional read. This book handles grief and mental illness beautifully. And it also features a half Asian and half white character which you don't often see in YA books. After losing her mum by suicide our protagonists Leigh goes to Taiwan to meet her maternal grandparents hoping to leave her guilt and actions behind her. I loved the authors way of using colours to showcase Leigh's emotions as a way to figure out what Leigh is feeling and the authors descriptions of colours and hues was astounding. I also really enjoyed how the author just didn't write off Dora's depression or explain her triggers most people who suffer from depression don't necessarily have triggers or reasons and its great way to showcase the complexity of the illness. All in all this is a fantastic lyrical read I hope a lot of people pick up. Trigger Warnings there is suicide so I would definitely put that out there before I recommend it to someone. Its about peoples safety first.

I really enjoyed the use of seeing colour to help determine emotion. This was my favourite aspect of the book. Having the main character, Leigh explain herself using colours was amazing. The tie in of the best friend asking "what colour" to determine Leigh's emotional state was awesome. I liked the author’s overall storyline but I don’t think I really liked the book. There were many pieces that I liked, the colours, the use of flashbacks to flesh out the story, the developing relationships, and the fact the author was not afraid to use depression and suicide in one of their main characters but I guess I lost something when all the pieces of the story were put together.

This was a little slow to get into but I enjoyed it once I got into it. The writing reminded me a lot of Jandy Nelson but still very unique on its own. This could be a perfect book club option for the Spring as there are many things that could be discussed through the whole book.

This was a breathtaking, beautiful, devastating book. I was blown away by how beautifully written it was - there was so much vulnerability, and so much beauty, and so much pain - that you could actually feel each emotion, and see it depicted as its own vivid hue.

Pan weaves this heartbreaking tale of love and loss - recurring themes that show up in every relationship, in every interaction, in every beautifully written part of this story. The otherworldly/paranormal aspects of this story tied in so well with the exploration of very real, very devastating issues such as mental illness, grief, suicide, and regret.

This book is truly something else - I haven’t read anything quite like it before, and I really did fall in love with this story, and with Pan’s writing.

I would definitely offer a content warning, for anyone who wants to pick up this book - it is beautifully written, but also painful, and raw - and pretty heavy. It covers topics like depression and suicide - and paints a really realistic picture of grief, and what it looks like when you lose someone you love.

This book depicts a very extreme case of depression. I was hesitant for a lot of the book because there was never a counter example provided or anything besides a few awkward emotional conversations between father and daughter about it. It does announce in text that it is an extreme case though. At one point depression was likened to "emo" teenagers and I feel like that is outdated now. Teenagers in 2018 are often better versed in mental health than that, than to struggle to say depression at all. In the end, it does give a list of resources and suicide awareness information. Despite my still lingering hesitations this book is very well written an interesting. (I will admit I was confused about some things but I think you're supposed to be).