𝘞𝘩𝘦𝘯 𝘩𝘦 𝘥𝘪𝘦𝘴, 𝘐 𝘧𝘢𝘭𝘭 𝘰𝘶𝘵 𝘰𝘧 𝘵𝘪𝘮𝘦.

On an August morning in 2020, Amy Lin's husband, Kurtis, sets out to run a half-marathon with Lin's family. Amy does not join them because she is nursing a recent leg injury. They are completing the "virtual" run on the roads around their vacation home due to the pandemic. Soon, Amy's father rushes back into the house and says, "Get in the car. It's Kurtis." Kurtis collapsed and was pronounced dead at the hospital. He was 32. "There is no known or visible reason for him to be dead, except that he is," she writes about the fact that the autopsy report could not determine a cause of death.

Shortly after Kurtis's death, Amy is hospitalised with deep vein thrombosis, with clots having travelled to her lungs. The doctors recommend "an aggressive approach" to treatment. Amy writes beautifully about how part of her brain was telling her to do whatever it took to survive, while another part told her that she should stop trying to live because "If I go now, I can still find him. He might even be waiting for me."

Here After is a lyrical memoir told in out-of-sequence vignettes, meaning the reader simultaneously experiences Lin's grief and her falling in love with Kurtis. For me, the non-chronological nature of the book perfectly captured the out-of-time feelings that come with grief, where you are unsure whether something just happened or was years ago, and enhanced the reading experience.

I always feel weird saying that I have enjoyed a memoir about grief, given that there is a death at the heart of the story, but Here After is a gorgeous memoir about love, loss, and learning to live with grief.

Here After: A Memoir by Amy Lin is published by Zibby Books.

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