If you have not yet read Let the Great World Spin, run to your neighborhood library and borrow it and share it with any and all teens who live with you. Winner of the National Book Award, it transcends time and place and reaches out to all of us who have experienced deep sorrow, helping us find comfort in wholly imperfect human compassion.
Today there is an interesting article in The New York Times about Colum McCann the gifted author of Let the Great World Spin at:
http://www.nytimes.com/2013/06/02/magazine/colum-mccanns-radical-empathy.html?hp