Hello? by Liza Wiemer weaves together five high school seniors’ stories about struggling in life to a brilliant ending of community.

Liza Wiemer’s five characters all have flaws. Human flaws which allow readers to connect deeply to each individual character. Tricia struggles with suicidal thoughts and discovering who she is after immense amounts of loss in a short life. Emerson wrestles with his past memories and appearances. Angie finds who she is based on herself alone, not her parents. Brenda survives the most traumatic moment in her life. Brian goes back to his roots after months of floating through life. The diversity of characters in Hello? reflects a realistic high school culture.

The diversity of the characters are reflected in the formatting of the chapters. Each character, besides Emerson and Tricia, have a specific format for their chapters. Emerson and Tricia’s chapters have the same format, but the similar formatting foreshadows the end of the book. Brian’s format resembles pretty simple prose formatting, but, to separate time gaps and ideas, drawings of his pottery line are shown throughout the book. The drawings added a little extra understanding and depth to Brian’s character. Angie’s chapters resemble free verse poetry. Her chapters play with the imagery and flow of the words. Finally, Brenda’s are written as a screenplay. The pages flew by with all the chapters as readers fell in love with the formatting of each character. Wiemer’s formatting of the chapters creates a memory in readers’ minds for years to come.

The situations Liza Wiemer places her characters in amazes readers. Hello? brilliantly discusses every circumstance of rape, death, suicide, accidents, love, lust, etc. Everything is talked about. By the end of the book, each character’s life looked up to a better future, but not in a cheesy way like other books tackling big life problems.

Hello? is set in Door County, Wis. By having the book set in a local favorite vacation spot, local readers easily visualize the small, tourist lakeside towns found up and down the Door Peninsula. When a book is set in a place you have visited or lived in numerous times, readers become more critical. Hello?, however, takes into account local places and delightfully describes the beauty of Door County. Through reading this book, readers transport back to the dog days of summer through numerous seasons.

Overall, Hello? rates at four, bordering on five, stars. Wiemer brings together characters as separate as the Breakfast Club crew and celebrates the diversity to create relationships between all of them in chance circumstances and long nights.