Friday, December 18, 2009

Seventeen

When seventeen-year-old Sophia dares to prove to her she should stay alive, her suffering is at its climax, her predicament at its worse, and her adolescence at its most difficult.
Sophia is taking summer courses at a New York City college before her senior year of high school, lured to the program by Shauna, her best friend from California. Blessed with all that society considers attractive and intelligent, Shauna succeeds with guy after guy, course after course. Sophia, meanwhile, fails in every course, at every challenge(especially attracting date-worthy males), and with everything she touches....or so she thinks.
Constantly reminded of her own beauty and brains, haunted by pangs of worthlessness, and noticed by only her lanky friend J.P., Sophia begs life for a single decent reason to stick around. Days slip by and she continues her silent countdown until...the greatest hope she can find becomes the deepest threat imaginable.
As she makes her final attempt to confront life among adults, this bold adolescent and feisty storyteller shreds the life she comes to know.
Sophia's plight is the plight of every girl or woman who's ever felt substandard, who'd ever questioned her own value, indeed every person who's ever wondered, "is life worth the suffering?"

I was amazed at this book. I was very very disappointed to have to give up on reading it. I get very close to the characters in the book I'm reading and if the book is good enough, I'll start to almost feel what they feel, and as you can tell, Sophia is suicidal. Reading this book was starting to throw me into a deep depression even though it was so good, and I finally had to call it quites. Not after reading the end of course! What amazed me the most was how...the author, was right on the dime with almost everything! He might as well have been a high school girl himself! If there is a woman out there who hasn't felt what Sophia is feeling at least once in there life I'd LOVE to meet them! If there is anyone out there who loves a good book and does't get too close to the characters...you should read this!

4 comments:

  1. Wow, that sounds like a powerful book! I love it when I can connect to characters like that.

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  2. That sounds like an amazing book, but I don't think I could bring myself to read about a suicidal teen. :-( Thank you for sharing our thoughts!

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  3. wowwwwwwwwwwww....this sounds really good! :):):):):):):):):):):):):):):):):):):)

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  4. You are a pretty insightful kid Lily!! I really enjoy your well thought out reviews!!!

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