This is a beautifully written book about choices, and how the choices
that you make can change things so far down the road, so drastically, in
wyas that you never could have possibly conceived.
The book
revolves around three main characters' POVs; Meg, her daughter Alex, and
Carl, who owns a business transporting troubled teens from their homes
to rehab type schools. All of the characters in this book are really
well-developed and relatable. Meg isn't the perfect mother; she makes
critical mistakes, like all mothers do, in the raising of her children.
She does what she feels is best for her kids; she's lost, unable to help
her daughter deal with the loss of her best friend and the downward
spiral her life has taken since her best friend's death. Alex is
struggling, with school, with drugs and is completely losing control of
her life, and all her mother wants to do is help her, although that help
often comes out in a way that her daughter rejects completely.
I'm
the mother of a teenager; I know how stubborn and hard-headed they can
be once they've set their minds on a certain path. And I know how hard
it can be to try and wind your own head down the same path. It made it
that much easier to connect with Meg, to understand her fears and
frustratons and her sadness. Her marriage was falling apart, her
daughter was falling apart and she just wanted to make everything
better. While I could sit here and shake my head at some of her
decisions, knowing that they aren't good decisions, I can totally see
myself making the same ones in her shoes, with the knowledge that she
has.
Alex is also a totally relatable character; you can feel her
pain and her guilt, over her friend's death and the decisions that
she's made since, while you can also understand why she continues to
make said decisions. Donovan does a wonderful job of really getting you
into the character's heads and helping you understand why they make the
choices they do, and how each choice ties back to another choice. She
shows you how the smallest things that you don't even notice later can
affect someone else in a way that you would never have anticipated.
Carl's
story was an interesting addition to the book; not necessarily a needed
point of view, but not a bad addition. It gave you a little of an
outsider's perspective to Alex and Meg, but one with a developed story
behind it. Carl's part of the story was able to give us a view of what
was going on when Alex disappeared, later in the book, as he was an
instrumental part of the search for Alex.
This book is a good,
quick read; the writing is beautiful and flows well throughout the story
and Donovan was able to hit on a lot of different points that should
appeal to a wide range of readers, whether this is a genre they would
typically enjoy or not. It's really outside of my normal reading scope,
but it was a nice change. Once I started the book, there was no putting
it down, so I was glad that today was the rainy and nasty kind of day
that is perfect for devouring a book in one sitting.
**I received
this book as part of Amazon's Kindle First program; the above review is
a true reflection of my thoughts regarding this book and has not been
influenced in any way.**
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