Francesca Lia Block

ECHO Echo is one of Ms. Block's longer stories. Its shifting storyline bounces back and forth across time and jumps between perspectives, always returning to first person when Echo is telling her own story. Mainly, Echo is a girl on a quest to find someone to love her as much as her parents loved each other. She has felt inadequate since young childhood when she saw how amazing and angelic her mother was and how entranced her father was with her; she has felt invisible for most of her young life. She searches for identity in the book and seeks to perfect herself by latching onto friends and lovers and going through bouts of dissatisfaction with her physical appearance. Echo tries to perfect herself by starving her body until she is sickly and thin, and later trying to achieve health and beauty by excessive workouts. She also is envious of all the beautiful people in her life and emulates them while wishing to be them. But eventually, Echo uses all of her experiences with her friends, lovers, and experiences to find that they were all her "angels," and that she is worthwhile in own right. The real-life hardships conveyed in Ms. Block's book stick to their usual poetic style, and it is simply a joy to read. Read an excerpt here. Back to Francesca Lia Block Page