When friends asked what I was getting up to this summer, I told them I was reading a couple dozen books about death — not the stuff of your typical beach TBR. 

But remembering you must die, as the latin phrase “memento mori” compels us to do, can make any bit of fun in the sun seem all the more meaningful.

According to CBC Arts producer and scholar Lise Hosein, Memento Mori (translated into English as “remember you must die”) started popping up in medieval European art in the form of things like skulls and rotting fruit to remind the viewer that their own death was imminent and so they should live a good (temporary) life in the meantime. 

The first time I encountered the phrase was in a collection of David Sedaris essays, which showed me how humor and mortality can go hand in hand. That’s not to say that some of the books on this list aren’t heavy. There’s a memoir about the sudden, yet somehow drawn-out death of Sedaris’s father-in-law. And the grief-stricken teenage love story that will break your heart in a million ways. But there’s also a title that collects the cookie recipes of those departed to keep their spirits alive, and a children’s book that is sure to make readers of all ages smile as they ponder mortality. Death can’t fit into a neat box, and neither can books about it. So whether you’re looking for levity or gravitas, I promise, there’s something here for you.

The simplicity and absurdity of Bird is Dead is the perfect introduction to mortality for young readers. It begins with a character in a state of denial after finding their friend and fellow bird lying on the ground with their feet up. Bird must be sleeping, they think. Soon, though, another avian companion drags them into reality: Bird is not sleeping; they’re dead. This picture book’s direct engagement with the realities of death can be jarring for anyone who grew up largely shielded from conversations around mortality. But with just the right amount of humor (like when one friend explains, “on your back+feet up=dead”) and plenty of acknowledgements of the grief that accompanies losing someone (the illustrated animals even bury their friend), this book is great for any kid who’s getting curious about what comes next.

Sometimes a wonderful, surprising title is enough to get you to pluck a book off the shelves. Death is Stupid will resonate with children and adults, whether they’re grieving or just starting to think about their own mortality. Higginbotham’s illustrations are handmade collages that follow a kid who, on top of dealing with the death of their grandmother and their dawning realization that everyone dies, is also fielding the more frustrating euphemisms often lobbed at mourners, from “she’s in a better place” to “she’s at rest.” What I love most about the book is how it never talks down to its young readers or discounts their contributions: The unseen narrator sometimes provides insight into how to approach death, like focusing on ways to remember those who have died with others who miss them. But other times, the young protagonist takes the lead. The book offers practical and philosophical approaches to grieving and death, and features a back section with activities like placing a picture of your dead loved one in a heart-shaped frame on one of the final pages, making them a part of this story, too.

If you went into a bookstore or a library and asked for the YA book about a boy in a near future where everyone knows the day they’re going to die, nine times out of 10 you’d be handed Adam Silvera’s Tik Tok–famous They Both Die At The End. Great book, highly recommend it. But the protagonists of Silvera’s novel have less than 24 hours from the time they’re told their fate to stare down their mortality. In Lance Rubin’s Denton Little’s Death Date, however, babies enter the world and are immediately slapped with an expiration date, meaning protagonist Denton has grown up facing down his demise, which is the same day as his senior prom. This conceit leads to funny and thought-provoking takes on cultural norms around death and dying. In Rubin’s world, the dying attend their own funeral because, well, wouldn’t you want to hear all the kind words your loved ones have for you? Denton Little’s Death Date quickly becomes a mystery/adventure novel, but even if those aren’t your go-to genres, this book will leave you questioning your relationship with your inevitable end.

The latest YA novel by Ali Novak (best known for My Life With the Walter Boys) tells the story of someone forced to confront their own mortality because of a life-threatening illness, but it highlights something universal: We know we have a limited time on this earth to do what we want to do, and that thought can sometimes be paralyzing rather than motivating. The book follows Cara, a girl who spent most of her teen years battling cancer but who is now in remission and isn’t sure what to do next. She only knows that she can never be exactly who she was before she got sick. When Cara discovers an old bucket list she never finished, she decides to tackle it in the hopes it will help her enter her next chapter. There’s been a bit of a glut of bucket-list books in the past decade, but this one stays fresh by centering someone who is suddenly not in imminent danger of dying.

This beautifully illustrated story of young love cut short cribs from the mythic romance of Orpheus and Eurydice; in classic YA fashion, the Greek tragedy is introduced in a classroom scene so the protagonists can begin meditating on it. But what sets this book apart from other modern retellings of the myth is that it asks not just what should be done in the face of grief, but how we should think about death as a state of being. The end is pretty emotionally devastating (and a good chunk of the middle is too), but it’s also beautiful, with lines and images you won’t stop thinking about.

Alex Krokus (or the fictionalized, raccoon version of the author) is being haunted by his dad’s ghost. As he gets through delivering the eulogy and begins to work on his grief, his dad is a constant presence. Sometimes he’s there to bring up old memories and other times to dispense more practical advice (nightmarish though it may seem that a parent could chide you from beyond the grave to open that Roth IRA). While a lot of the memoir is Alex asking family and friends for the best ways to deal with grief, the most impactful moments raise questions about the overlap of life and death, like when the Krokus’s brother asks, “Is that messed up? To think about someone’s eulogy while they’re still alive?” Or when Alex’s ghost dad recounts seeing his own father-in-law at the end of his life completely out of it but totally happy. This funny and poignant graphic novel is a reminder that just as grief is messy and personal, so is how we think about death — our loved ones’ and our own.