Publisher's Synopsis
Raffaela Schlotter's father has just told her that he planned to kill himself six years ago. He'd had it all planned out, even crafting a lengthy suicide note titled HALLELUJAH explaining the decision. The only thing that prevented his suicide was the death of her mother a few weeks before the date he'd chosen to end it all. Now, he expects Raffa to smile through a family vacation after he 's shared the contents of his suicide note.As Raffa, her father, and her sister travel the eastern shores of Michigan, Raffa dissects the note as well as the fiction of her mentally ill father in the form of epistles to her late mother. She tries to understand the impact her father's mental health has had on his faith, marriage, parenting, and writing, and how it all relates to her newly awakened depression. As she annotates the manuscript, she worries that her father is on the verge of another suicide attempt and struggles to help him before it's too late.
