How to Write a Suicide Note: serial essays that saved a woman's life

Sherry Quan Lee
Loving Healing Press (2008)
ISBN 9781932690637
Reviewed by Kam Aures for RebeccasReads (6/08)

“How to Write a Suicide Note- Serial Essays That Saved a Woman’s Life” is Book #2 in the “Reflections of America Series” that “highlights autobiography, fiction, and poetry which express the quest to discover one’s context within modern society.”  Sherry Quan Lee grew up poor, the daughter of a Chinese father and a Black mother.  Although of mixed race, she has usually passed for white, which based on the author’s photo on the back of the book, I can completely see happening.  She also has always married white men, even though she loves women.

It took the author six years to complete the book as she did not follow any hard, fast writing rules.  She started out attempting to write in prose form but the writing was not flowing as she had wished, so she transformed her notes into poetry instead.  The writings in this book are a form of therapy for her.  Expressing her feelings on paper allows her “to name the racist, sexist, classist experiences” that kept pulling her down and made her feel worthless and unloved.   She then proceeds to squash these issues out in the form of suicide notes.

Sherry Quan Lee believes that writing is what saved her life.  In the past, she has attempted suicide in an effort to be acknowledged and loved, but now she writes to live.  Writing about the trauma in her life allows her to examine it, be angry about it, and then, finally, to let it go. Getting these past events written down allows new doors to open for her and allows her a fresh start.

In some ways in reading “How to Write a Suicide Note- Serial Essays That Saved a Woman’s Life,” I almost felt as if I was intruding into a person’s private thoughts and space.  However, I applaud Quan Lee’s intimate, risk-taking venture in writing this book of poetry.  She is a very honest person and does not hold anything back.  Her work is very original and I have never read anything quite like it before.  For these reasons I recommend this book to anyone who enjoys poetry and/or memoirs.