Rowen is a 17-year-old girl with a lot of baggage. Her father blames her for the unexplained death of her infant brother seven years earlier, her mother has barely gotten out of bed in those seven years, and her 15-year-old sister hates her and wants to ruin her life any way she can. Rowen just wants to finish high school, go to college, and get out of her town. But with so many obstacles in her way, her success in meeting these goals is not guaranteed. And this is YA, so it still requires a best friend (Jess, who has her own family problems,) and a romantic interest (Mike, the star soccer player with the perfect family.)
Also, as a note, if self-harm, suicide, rape, or domestic violence are triggers, this isn’t the book for you.
As an adult reading this book, I just wanted to slap most of the adults who let Rowen down in so many ways. From the teachers who didn’t understand her reaching out for help, to her grandmother who knows the worst secret the whole time and sits on it, to her parents who either ignore her completely or beat the crap out of her, everyone in her life lets her down.
The only people really there for her are Jess and Mike, so it’s easy to understand why she falls for him. But those two characters are pretty flat, and it’s hard to understand their motivation in getting involved to help Rowen. Perhaps this is an effect of the book being written from Rowen’s perspective — the seemingly superficial relationships might be more of a reflection on how she sees herself than anything else — but I really would still have liked more dimension to the characters who are’t Rowen.
Disclaimer: I received an e-galley of this book from LibraryThing and Cerulean Publishing in exchange for my honest review. It has not influenced my opinion.