Wow. Amazing. I finished this in two days. Willow has experienced something that no teenager deserves. Her parents drank too much at dinner and asked her to drive them home. It was raining and she lost control of the car. And she lost her parents in the accident.
To deal with her pain--which equates to avoiding her pain--Willow cuts herself.
I loved Patricia McCormick's Cut, but Willow's story is so emotional--I bawled throughout the second half of the book. The way Hoban describes the turmoil Willow experiences is realistic and I actually feel like I have a better understanding of why cutters choose to manage their pain in this fashion.
There is a "first time" scene written very well, and Hoban blurs the fine line between passion and pain, love and hate, and while this book is very young-adult friendly (they will love how Willow and Guy's relationship develops), any adult who may work with teenagers or know of cutters, should read this book because of the way this method of control is described. Awesome awesome awesome book.
