FFWD Weekly
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Books by Trevor Klassen Veronika Decides to Die by Paulo Coelho HarperCollins, 210 pp. Veronika is smart, beautiful and 24 – and she has decided to kill herself. She is not sick, depressed or insane, she is merely tired of living, so she takes some pills. Her attempted suicide fails. She awakens in a mental hospital named Villette and discovers that the pills have profoundly affected her heart – she has but a few days to live. In Veronika Decides to Die, Paulo Coelho (famous for The Alchemist) has written simply – terribly simply – about actual events. Every nuance of feeling is explained. If Veronika has any doubts about life, Coelho tells us. If she falls in love with a schizophrenic, Coelho tells us. All his prose is unadorned – even his main theme, that sanity has no absolute measure but is based only upon consensus, is utterly undisguised. He makes the point repeatedly, and the lesson so obvious to the reader is this: Live not according to society’s rules, but to that of one’s own heart. Coelho’s simple prose is effective in treating profound subjects simply, but his philosophical technique breaks the main rule of good storytelling – show, don’t tell. Perhaps this rule-breaking is to further his theme’s purpose. Such a potentially moving story as Veronika’s (self-discovery in the face of death) loses its power by explaining everything. Witness her speech when her doctor tells her she will die on the morrow: "If I’ve still got 24 hours of life left, and there are so many experiences waiting for me, I (have) decided it would be better to put aside despair." Brave words from a brave woman, but it would have been better had Coelho showed her courage by describing a subtle glance, a meaningful gesture. During her stay at Villette, Veronika doubts, fears and questions reality. She learns to live. Coelho has neglected a truth about life’s meaning, about fine stories – they are not to be explained, but discovered.

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