We’re so excited to be a part of the blog tour for THINGS I’M SEEING WITHOUT YOU by Peter Bognanni, but before we dive into our guest post we want to tell you what this book is about!
Things I'm Seeing Without You by Peter Bognanni (Website, Twitter, Goodreads)Published by Penguin Young Readers Group on 2017
Genres: Contemporary, Death & Dying, Family, Parents, Romance, Social Themes, Young Adult Fiction
Pages: 336
Format: ARC
Seventeen-year-old Tess Fowler has just dropped out of high school. She can barely function after learning of Jonah’s death. Jonah, the boy she’d traded banter with over texts and heartfelt e-mails.
Jonah, the first boy she'd told she loved and the first boy to say it back.
Jonah, the boy whose suicide she never saw coming.
Tess continues to write to Jonah, as a way of processing her grief and confusion. But for now she finds solace in perhaps the unlikeliest of ways: by helping her father with his new alternative funeral business, where his biggest client is . . . a prized racehorse?
As Tess’s involvement in her father’s business grows, both find comfort in the clients they serve and in each other. But love, loss, and life are so much more complicated than Tess ever thought. Especially after she receives a message that turns her life upside down.
Funny, heartbreaking, hopeful, and wondrous, in the vein of Six Feet Under and I’ll Give You the Sun, Things I'm Seeing Without You is a beautiful examination of what it means to love someone, to lose someone, and to love again.
Links to Send Your Long Distance Partner// Peter Bognanni
The characters in my new book are in a long distance relationship. In their honor, I present the following ways to bridge the gap of long distance with help from the Internet. They come with no guarantee or official endorsement. Except the last one. It’s a sure-fire win.
1) Sometimes the pressure is too high to write the perfect love letter (or email or text) Why not fill in the gap with history’s greatest love letters. Here’s a glimpse at Virginia Woolf and Vita Sackville West’s astounding and beautiful correspondence.
https://www.brainpickings.org/2016/08/19/vita-virginia-letters/
2) The montage of kisses from Cinema Paradiso is one of the most famous scenes in film history. Here’s the setup: a man goes back to his hometown where he once helped the projectionist in a local cinema. In his youth, all the kisses were censored out of the films by the town priest. But the projectionist leaves the man a reel of all those illicit, edited kisses. It’s a highlight reel of classical Hollywood smooching that will leave anyone breathless. Send it for inspiration.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=PjtJkBUVFVY
3) Why not dedicate a song, like I used to do at the Skating Rink when I was ten? Now you don’t need uncomfortable roller skates or pre-teen longing. Just YouTube. Here’s a personal favorite of mine by Big Star about the agony and purity of teen love. It appears in the book.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=pte3Jg-2Ax4
4) Before he started drawing adorable Star Wars books, cartoonist Jeffrey Brown published comics about the everyday details of his relationships. These moments are often hilarious and painfully real. They’d make a decent stand-in for the actual thing if you’re in a fix and need some awkward intimacy.
https://www.tumblr.com/search/clumsy%20by%20jeffrey%20brown
5) Finally, who would want to send regular flowers when you could send ironic flowers? When we were first dating, I sent my long distance girlfriend the biggest bunch of purple carnations it was possible to order. The card said: Here is a giant purple reminder of my love. Might I recommend these dog floral arrangements from Pinterest? What says I love you better than a floral Boston Terrier?
https://www.pinterest.com/rringler16/dog-and-animal-flower-arrangements/
About Peter Bognanni
Peter Bognanni is a writer currently based in Saint Paul, Minnesota. His first novel, The House of Tomorrow, is out now from Amy Einhorn Books (Putnam). He attended the Iowa Writers' Workshop not long ago, and his short stories and humor pieces have appeared in various literary journals. He teaches Creative Writing at Macalester College and works (almost) every day on a new book.
