ISU alumna Bree Housley will be at the Iowa State University Bookstore 11 a.m. on April 19, 2013 to sign her new book.

Housley’s new book “We Hope You Like This Song” is a tale of her journey in honoring her best friend Shelly’s memory.

Shelly died at the age of 25 due to complications from pre-eclampsia. After her death, Housley felt like she was not doing enough to honor her best friend.

After a conversation with some of her friends at a bar one evening, Housley knew what she needed to do to pay tribute to her friend’s memory.  

“We Hope You Like This Song” endeavors on Housley’s one-year journey to keep the memory of Shelly alive and act like her best friend would.

Housley describes herself as having nerd-like qualities while Shelly had the outgoing, passionate and fun personality. 

“It’s just that kind of standing back and watching people who were comfortable in social situations and in class when you had to pick a partner for things,” Housley said. “I would always hang back, very self-conscious.”

The first memory Housley recalls of their friendship was in the fourth grade. Shelly and Housley were waiting on their fathers after a music program that they had performed in school.

Shelly took Housley’s hand and they skipped to the drinking fountain. On their way to the drinking fountain they made up a song:

“We’re going to get a drink,

A drink, a drink.

We’re going to get a drink,

And we hope you like this song.”

“Ten years later we would still sing it at random times,” Housley said. Thus the title of the book was appropriately named.

“I just felt it was really meaningful to me.…It just felt like a nice tie-in,” Housley said. The year-and-a-half process to write the book was the therapeutic help Housley needed to heal from the loss.

While writing the book, Housley was excited to sit down and write the book every night. The memories were easy to remember, but were sometimes hard to write down.

“I’m not really a crier. I try to keep things bottled up,” Housley said. “But just finally letting it all out a bit really got to me. It was hard but in a good way.”

Now with her first book out, Housley is planning on writing another book. The plans for the future book are unknown, but it will be a more “safe-style” and fun book instead of a more personal style like that of “We Hope You Like This Song.”