by Julia Hoban
ages: 14+
First sentence: “Maybe it’s just a scratch.”

As it turns out, Heather, Kailana and I all read this book within weeks (days?) of each other, which we realized thanks to Twitter. I had such a grand time doing a buddy review with Kailana, that when she suggested that the three of us review this one together, I couldn’t say no.

The format we used was to each ask one question about the book that the others would respond to. Mine is below the plot summary…. for the other questions/reviews, stop by Heather‘s and Kailana‘s blogs today.

Willow has done the unthinkable: seven months ago, she was driving her parents home in a rainstom when she lost control of the car, totalling it and killing both of her parents instantly. That is she is grief-stricken is an understatement: she is terrified of facing the grief and so has taken to cutting. The physical pain of the razor slicing her skin is for her, much more bearable than the emotional pain of dealing with her parents’ death. So, she goes about in a haze, cutting herself when things get too bad. Until she meets Guy, who finds that as much as Willow wants him to, he just isn’t able to leave her to her destructive ways. It’s because gets involved in her life in ways that Willow didn’t expect that finally allows her to begin healing.

What did you think of the book being written in present tense? Did it work for you, or not?

Heather: I thought it added something to the immediacy of her situation. Made it seem more precarious, more…real. I think if it had been in past tense it would have had that “already happened” feeling and, for me at least, would have made me feel certain that she came out okay. Being present tense kept me feeling unsure, worried, was she going to be okay? Would she learn to deal with her pain in a different way? Or would she seriously hurt herself? It definitely worked for me; in fact, I don’t think I would have liked it nearly as much if it had been written in anyway other than the way it was.

Kailana: I liked the writing style. I thought it worked really well for this story because we learned what Willow was going through with her. We experienced it as she was experiencing it; which I thought was fitting considering how complicated things were for her. Willow was a teenager living her life and the reader got to live it with her, so I think that the present tense was a good idea and worked well for the novel.

Me: This doesn’t really have a lot to do with being in present tense, but I think it can fit here… This the first time I can remember reading a book the main character dealt with pain in such an obviously addicting and destructive behavior. It was painful for me, as the reader, to see such obvious pain in a person, and yet be nearly powerless to do anything about it. Because, on top of being grief-stricken, Willow is a terribly unreliable narrator. Sure, the book is written in third person present tense (which usually drives me nuts), but we’re seeing things from Willows perspective. And, as I could tell more and more as the book went on, Willow was wantonly misinterpreting almost everything around her. It made the cutting more powerful, and the reader more helpless.

It was a good book: gripping and powerful as well as ultimately healing, and in ways that really worked for me as a reader (including the sex scene at the end, which really surprised me). Worth reading.