Emily Firestone finally has her bipolar disorder under control. She has her own place, a job she loves, and she has a wonderful boyfriend named Paolo. Although Emily doesn't particularly like the water, she agrees to a weekend sailing trip with him. He's an excellent swimmer, so when Emily wakes the next morning in the middle out the water with Paolo nowhere to be found she knows he didn't drown. But what else could have happened? As the days go by Emily is starting to believe that Paolo was murdered. And the police believe she's the murderer. This was a quick read. The author lost me towards the end. It just seemed too much, too convenient, too predictable. I couldn't wait to find out what happened to Paolo. Emily's mind is racing, she's frantic, she has to find answers and find them soon and it's easy to get caught up in the rush with her. I was rooting for her. But sadly, this book lacked that oomph I was hoping for that would make it an...

When Ingrid was younger she traveled all over Europe with her opera star mother, Margot-Sophia. They were so happy. But then Margot-Sophia could no longer sing and they no longer acknowledged the past. They settled into a small, normal life but Ingrid desperately wanted their old life back. Now Ingrid is on a summer wilderness survival trek for at-risk teens. She has no idea why her mother sent her here. It's grueling and every day she feels as though she's going to break. But she has to figure out why she's here and why the music really stopped. I don't think there's anything I disliked. Ingrid had a magical childhood. Then things went downhill and fast. I liked her very much. She was a strong person. She was self-aware. She didn't give up. She was sarcastic. I liked the setting. The wilderness survival thing was fun to read. Ingrid went through a lot - physically, emotionally, mentally. She would write letters to her mother telling her about all t...

Lily Michaels-Ryan is a highschooler with ADHD. When breaking something lands her in detention with Abelard, a beautiful and brilliant guy who has Asperger's, she can't help but feel intrigued. He seems thirty seconds behind in a conversation while she's thirty seconds ahead. When a paper gets posted online - one that never should have been posted in the first place - Lily and Abelard discover that they both love old novels, especially The Letters of Abelard of Heloise. The two fall for each other hard but their relationship isn't going to be an easy one.  Those black lines through the hearts got my attention. I was hooked from the very first page. The writing is so good - the whole book flowed smoothly, the characters were three-dimensional and they were interesting. We get a glimpse of what it's like for Lily being a teenager with ADHD. School is hard for her and nobody understands her. She feels like she's dragging her mother down. She has to make some tough ...

Corey has moved away from the small town of Lost Creek, Alaska, and her best friend, Kyra. It's been seven months and she's just days away from going back to visit. But Kyra has died. Corey is devasted and confused. How could this have happened? Kyra promised to wait for her. When Corey returns to Lost, it isn't the same small community who accepted her and talked about Kyra, saying she didn't belong because of her mental illness. It's the opposite - Corey is the outsider now and Kyra is praised for her talent. The people of Lost say her death was meant to be. But Corey knows it wasn't meant to be. She knows Lost is keeping secrets and she's going to find out what they are. When I started this book I thought it was so good! The writing was wonderful, the bond between the two girls was strong, the Alaskan setting was beautiful. I put this down just after the halfway point because I needed sleep. I couldn't understand how this book was getting such low r...

Ever since Addison Sullivan has been in an accident, she's been having a hard time concentrating, a hard time sleeping, and she starts talking to a boy that no one else can see. She's worried she's going crazy. She doesn't feel as though she can talk to her parents or her brother, so in order to understand what's going on she visits a local medical facility that promises to help with memory. As she's leaving the clinic she finds out this wasn't her first visit - she's already had certain memories erased. Addison had a boy erased from her memory. Now she's determined to figure out who he was and what happened that she felt like her only option was to have him erased from her life. This was a quick and easy read. It switches between before Addison was in the accident and after. I liked getting glimpses of how things were before. I thought when she started seeing someone no one else could it was going to go a completely different way than it did, but th...

College senior Lana Granger has constructed her future by lying about her past. Shortly after she begins babysitting a manipulative eleven-year-old boy, her best friend Beck mysteriously disappears. Eyewitnesses say Lana was the last person to see Beck. She finds herself telling more lies - to the police, to friends, to herself. She's trying to keep things together especially now that she knows there's someone out there who's trying hard to expose her secrets. This was good! It was a page-turner with lots of suspense and twists and turns. I really appreciate the creativity that went into this book. I enjoyed uncovering all of Lana's secrets and learning why she wanted so desperately to bury her past. 

Victoria Zell doesn't fit in. She was the new kid last year at St. Ann's - a close-knit Catholic school - and still hasn't made any friends. But now she's not the new kid anymore. Mysterious and charismatic Z is. He makes her feel special. He makes everyone in the whole school feel special. Victoria becomes obsessed with Z, trying to figure out who he really is. And that's when something terrible happens. This book was so good. I devoured it so I didn't have a chance to put the pieces together that I may have noticed otherwise. I love how this is Victoria's story about what happened, written to her boyfriend, Andrew. The whole story flowed well, the characters felt real, I enjoyed the twists and turns. I also really enjoyed the police interviews with students, teachers and parents. Definitely worthy of a re-read.

Cassie has been dealing with a lot the last couple of years. Her mother died, she doesn't have a good relationship with her father who is an ex-Navy SEAL, she has no friends. Now she hears voices. The day she makes a gruesome discovery on the beach is the same day she starts to hear a voice inside her head. If she doesn't obey it, it will punish her. The voice is constantly putting her down. She falls in love with one of the guys staying in the apartment above the garage for the summer, but she's too embarrassed to tell him about the voice. She doesn't want his pity. She can't explain where she goes every Thursday night, the night she sneaks off to the bowling alley for the voice support group. Things didn't end well between the two of them. But she wants another chance and this is her writing an e-mail trying to explain why she pushed him away. I loved the writing and the fact that this book was a long e-mail. I liked Cassie. She felt real to me. She's just...

Jonah Daniels is a seventeen-year-old who has a passion for cooking and is following in his father's footsteps. But with his father's sudden death six months ago, he has more on his plate than just black cherry cobbler. His mother has withdrawn from her family. She spends all her time in her bedroom while Jonah and his two older siblings look after their three younger siblings. Vivi Alexander and her mother are staying in Verona Cove for the summer. Vivi is a vivacious sixteen-year-old who loves art and fashion. And Jonah Daniels. But her world is not all twinkle lights and glitter. She's been keeping something from Jonah and it takes something extreme for him to find out what it is. The cover is lovely. The title is great. All the characters in this book were phenomenal, but I fell in love with Vivi. I loved her personality and her story. I don't have a word for the author's writing, it was soooo good! It was an honest and realistic portrayal of someone living with...

Izzy Stone is seventeen. Her mother fatally shot her father while he slept ten years ago and she has refused to visit her in prison. She was living with her grandmother until she passed away and has been with several foster families. But her new foster parents seem great. They're curators at the local museum and have asked for Izzy's help cataloging the items found inside an old state asylum. The asylum makes her uncomfortable as it makes her think of her mother's "insanity." As she goes through one of the former patient's belongings she's taken to another time in search of answers. Clara Cartwright was eighteen years old in 1929 when she was sent away to a genteel home for nervous invalids; her overbearing father furious at her for rejecting an arranged marriage and falling in love with an Italian immigrant. But when he can no longer afford her care at the home after losing money in the stock market crash, Clara is committed to the asylum. This is a weird...

Samantha McAllister is part of the "mean girls" clique in high school. Underneath her make-up, straightened hair, and carefully chosen outfits she's hiding a secret - she has OCD. She even sees a psychiatrist for it. She knows if her friends ever found out they would torture her, but they've been her whole life for so many years that she has nowhere else to go. Until she meets Caroline. Caroline is the complete opposite of what her friends would approve of. She shows Sam a secret room known as "Poet's Corner" where a small group of friends meet a couple of times a week. Sam discovers a whole new side of herself, a side she really likes, a "normal" side. But she has to keep her new friends a secret. This story felt flat and unrealistic to me. It deals with a serious topic but doesn't give a realistic representation of it. The story focused on Sam finding herself through friends she actually liked, people who were actually nice to her. Basica...

Jenny Kramer is brutally raped in the woods outside of a house party. In the hours immediately after, her parents are given a choice to allow the doctors to give Jenny a drug that will immediately erase her memory of the assault. Her father does not want her to be given the drug, he wants Jenny to remember her attacker so he can be punished, but her mother absolutely wants it so her daughter can be "fixed" and they can all move on like it never happened. But in the months that follow, Jenny has emotions about what happened but no memories to attach them to. Her father becomes obsessed with catching the attacker. No one wants to believe it could be someone in their close-knit community. And things begin to unravel for all involved. My thoughts are all over the place. This book is told by a narrator, which I was not expecting and sometimes did not like. I thought it was going to be Jenny's story, but it seems the narrator told their own story. We learn who the narrator is s...

Full-time mother Ella devotes all her time to caring for and protecting Harry, her son with Tourette's and ADHD. Husband and father Felix spends all his time working. When Ella has a heart attack it turns their lives upside down. She can no longer care for Harry, Felix has to become a parent, and Harry worries about his mother while trying to impress his father and figure out his future.  The ending was not very well crafted at all. Some parts dragged on and on.

As a child Brian was extremely sheltered by his mother to the point of it being unhealthy. So it's no surprise that as an adult Brain has isolated himself from the world - he is full of anxiety and avoids people as much as he can. He's constantly putting himself down and finding reasons why no one could ever like him. His world is turned upside down when he finds seven-year-old Abigail hiding in the mechanical room at the school he works at as a night custodian. He notices scars on Abigail and knows she's been through more than she should at her age. Brian wants to help but doesn't feel as though he should because he doesn't want to ruin her life. But after that day Abigail becomes attached to Brian and views him as someone she can trust and eventually she helps break down the walls he has built and in turn he has helped Abigail with her abandonment issues. I've struggled with social anxiety most of my life. It was weird reading Brian's thoughts and feelings...

A novel about a young man's experience of growing up with a schizophrenic mother and a loving father. The young man begins studying acting and tries hard to escape from who he truly is and leave his home life behind. Eventually he has to decide whether he can continue hiding in his new life or embrace the situation and return to help his family. The author has a way with words. The story flows together well, the characters are well developed, and I had a hard time putting this book down.

A semi-autobiographical book about a sixteen year old schizophrenic girl who lives in her dark imaginary world. Her parents take her to a mental hospital where she stays for three years.  

Made up or not, I don't care; I love this book. Written in a unique style, this page turner tells the story of a drug addict and his journey to get clean. I was addicted.

It's a choppy memoir about a guy with Asperger's. It's not bad at the beginning, but then it's just a bunch of poorly written one-dimensional stories.

I wanted to like this book because "everyone else likes it" but I didn't. I didn't get absorbed or lost in the book. It didn't leave me wanting more. It was just blah.

I read this book when I was fifteen. I don’t care whether it’s fact or fiction; I was engrossed.  A fifteen year old girl writes in her journal almost every day for a year about her spiral into a world of drugs.