Chris Whitaker is a British author who had me mesmerized with “We Begin at the End” (2020) and “All the Colors of the Dark” (2024). In both, his principal characters are tragic, and the stories evoke sadness, compassion, and at least a spark of hope. After reading both, I discovered an interview with the author on line. It became clear that events in his own childhood, particularly physical abuse by a man who lived with his mother for a while, gave him the personal experience that makes childhood a sorrowful time for many children.
I reviewed the first of these books in my Oct. 23, 2024, column and the second in my Oct. 9, 2024, column because I read them in that order. Each, however, is a stand-alone book, and they can be read in any order.
That is also true of “The Forevers” (2021, 340 pages in softcover format). In this YA novel, the author asks the question, What if you were 17 years old and knew that the world would come to an end in thirty days? That’s the question that troubles Mae throughout the novel.