In this first novel from the creator of the television show Babylon 5, 12 depressed and ill people take a cross-country bus trip with the intended aim of committing suicide.
Zeke’s belated explanation for wanting to die will cause the coldest of hearts to melt ... All [characters] are sensitively portrayed, and their stories are reminders that, to some, suicide can seem to be the only logical or sensible end ... Is there a happy ending here? Readers may need to think twice about how to define 'happy.' Nevertheless, 11 U.S. states now allow physician-assisted suicide, reflecting increasing acceptance of the right to die on one’s own terms.
Straczynski...uses text messages, emails, online journal entries and audio transcripts to reveal the characters’ thoughts and actions, creating a 21st-century epistolary novel. Because of this format, the novel moves along quickly, although the characters’ thoughts occasionally blur together, especially when musing philosophically on the state of the world and their places in it. But a late plot twist is satisfying, intensifying the characters’ bonds as they decide what to do. While a novel about characters planning to end their lives is not for everyone (as the introduction notes, 'discretion is advised'), Together We Will Go is, in the end, about friendship and learning to love.
... provocative ... It turns out to be far from a grim trip as they all find much-needed kinship, celebrate their lives, and even run afoul of the law. The plot may make Straczynski’s first novel controversial; certainly it’s a conversation starter, and there’s no denying that it is compulsively readable, replete with compelling characters, surprising twists, and heady themes.
