I Found Your Diary

by Frances Thomas

Surely a diary is private - but when Tom Palmer found one thrown in a skip, he didn't feel too bad about reading it. And he found it contained fascinating. The diarist, Hannah, writes about the attraction she feels for the charismatic new English teacher at her school, and the whole frantic build up to her sister's wedding. But she also mentions glimpsing a ghostly figure of her own self as a down-and-out. Tom is told that to see such a ghost of oneself (a Fetch), is an omen of one's death, so he worries about what has happened to her. He tries to find her, even if only to give the diary back. But is the girl he meets at the end really Hannah - or the Fetch

160 pages, Paperback

First published December 28, 2004

Reviews

[Anne · Rating 3 out of 5]

At first I felt like the ending was sort of interrupting the whole storyline. But after overthinking it for a while, I did get what happened to her, because of the details the writer gave away in some parts of the story. By that I did appreciate the writers style and it didnt feel like a dead end as much as it did at first.

[_thebrightestplace_ · Rating 1 out of 5]

This book is a pure disappointment.
I had to read this for my English class, and I’m glad that I had the opportunity to read such a disappointing book!
So the plot is pretty much that Tom finds Hannah’s diary and reads it. There she talks about her eating disorder and her attraction to her English teacher. She then proceeds to sleep with her teacher and starts to see her own ghost.
The ending is the most disappointing part out of everything. It ends with Tom finding Hannah, but till there. He just finds her but what happens after that, we don’t know.
Every story here was unsolved.
Tom finding her diary, how does it end? We don’t know.
Hannah sleeping with her teacher? We don’t know.
Her seeing her own ghost? We don’t know.
Her eating disorder? We don’t know.
Why was the diary thrown away? We don’t know.
Every story the writer had started, he did not finish at all.
It was such a slow book. I understand that it’s a diary, but at the end of the day this is a book.
We were going sometimes from day to day and every day was the same as the previous one. For a long time nothing really happened and you were reading the same thing all over again.
On top of that everyone is insulting each other all of the time.

[Rosa van Wijnbergen · Rating 1 out of 5]

Had to read it for school. It sucked.

[Foxglove · Rating 2 out of 5]

I used to read this again and again when I was younger and I don’t think I ever realised how blatantly problematic this book is. Ignoring the predatory teacher, who is obviously supposed to be painted in a negative light, there is a lot of body shaming, including referring to another girl as a ‘fat cow’. There is also ingrained misogyny throughout the book that doesn’t seem to be intentionally placed so much as it is just weaved into the story.
Aside from that, the writing style is truly abysmal at times, and there are random plot points that get introduced and dropped.
Two stars purely because I do think the grooming by the English teacher was presented fairly well.

[Stefani · Rating 1 out of 5]

Such an odd little, open-ended book about a teenage girl falling in love with her English teacher in the form of her diary. Aimed at learners of the English language at a certain level, it's written in very simple language and comes with a glossary in the end. I'm definitely not the target audience of this and I will swap this next time I do a book swap :)))

[Nikita Korver · Rating 3 out of 5]

A short story with the backstory of a grown man taking adventage of a young girl. Tom really made a personal connection with the young girl and that makes this book more realistic. A good read overall.

[M W · Rating 2 out of 5]

- MINOR SPOILERS -

I read this a few years ago. It starts of seeming to set up something intriguing (especially with the discussions about how a body was found on the news) but those turn out to be completely unrelated which makes the ending absolutely underwhelming. Wouldn’t read again.

[Shin · Rating 1 out of 5]

I remember I liked the premise of this story, that's why I picked it up. But in the end I was left disappointed and dissatisfied. When I have books that for some reason I didn't like, I try to reread them after time and see if I understand them better now, and maybe like it after all. This is not the case. It wasn't even the open ending with no answers, it was the whole book. Painful reading. I understand people (and even more teenages) can be like that, like these characters are written, but it was just too bad. I don't know, maybe if that ending wasn't so open, and they would talk and he got her "eyes open", and she would tell him how she's doing (better or not), maybe we'd see some kind of progress, character development, positive note for the future. But right now it was waste of time.

[Teresa · Rating 4 out of 5]

Enjoyable read! Good if you want a short fiction book to pass time :)

[Emma · Rating 1 out of 5]

I was really into this book and was so curious about its ending, then the ending just cut off right before you find out what happens! Very annoying.