By Katie McGarry.
Echo Emerson was one of the "popular" girls. She was an artist, she had a popular dude boyfriend. She also had divorced parents and a bipolar artist mother that her did did everything to get custody away from. Oh yeah, and Dad ended up marrying the babysitter. Two years ago, Echo's brother died in the war, and her mother snapped and tried to kill her. Echo doesn't remember the incident, but has tons of scars up her hands and arms that she can't explain. Her dad has a restraining order out on her mom, he's knocked up his new wife, and he forces Echo to take business classes instead of art. There's also the mandatory CPS therapy sessions that Echo has to go through with the new counselor at school, Mrs. Collins.
Three years ago, Noah Hutchins was a budding jock from a loving family of three boys. Then while he was out on a date, his house burned down and his parents died. Noah got thrown into foster care alone, into a series of crappy homes. After punching an abusive foster father, he now has a terrible reputation in the system and is only allowed to see his brothers occasionally under supervision. Having lost what remains of his family, he's determined to file for custody of them once he turns 18. He's also in CPS-mandated counseling at school with Mrs. Collins, who assigns Echo to tutor him (not that this happens a lot). Yes, this is kind of a "bad boy meets good girl" sort of story, but not really. Noah may smoke some joints and have a few tats, but he's clearly a good dude at heart who hasn't been able to keep up the jock rep given his changes in circumstances. He's still protective as all hell of his little brothers and his foster siblings.
Echo and Noah hit it off, adorably. He's not freaked by her scars the way her ex is, and he is totally down with being with her and helping her, and vice versa. (They have a running arrangement to try to sneak into their files if possible, which doesn't really fly.) After realizing that things can't be fixed with her old boyfriend, who is still uncomfortable with her scars and is dumb enough to drag her to a war movie, Echo gets together with Noah even if "the popular crowd" isn't cool with it. While Echo's best friend Lila stands by her, there's another so-called (more like fair weather popularity) friend Grace who will only associate with Echo if she's acting popular and dating a popular boy again. Feh on her. While Noah's foster sister Beth isn't real thrilled with Echo, she hits it off with other folks on his side.
Echo starts to remember what her mother did to her with the help of Mrs. Collins, who really does strike me as a great therapist, even if she kind of skirts the boundaries of what I suspect she's legally allowed to do. Mrs. Collins is also great backup to Noah in helping him see his brothers and figure out how to handle the situation. After finding out the truth--which is an emotional steamroller for plenty of reasons-- Echo needs to sort things out for herself on a lot of levels. It's an emotional rollercoaster of a book when it comes to the parental situations and revelations. We're pretty damn sure that Echo's dad is a jerk from the first few pages of the book--and yeah, in some ways he is--but as things go on, you understand what happened and why he does what he does. Likewise, Noah and his brothers' foster parents see each other as the enemy--Noah is convinced the kids are being abused and Carrie and Joe are hiring lawyers to keep him away--but they eventually realize that everyone's been acting with the kids' best interests at heart. While Echo's mom...okay, she's the one real villain in the piece, I have to say. But you get why Echo had fond feelings for her and misses her, when she wasn't having crazy moments.
As for the the not-so-hot bits of this book, there are not too many. There's a third act breakup--Echo and Noah somewhat reasonably assume that their relationship won't help Noah win a custody case under the circumstances--which is frustrating after awhile. And while most people in this book are developed well or fairly well in one way or another, I didn't think that Echo's best friend Lila ever stood out to me as a personality compared to everyone else. Most YA books do a good job of portraying girl-girl friendships, but Lila's importance to Echo pretty much fell by the wayside to me.
Overall, this is a very well written story, with compelling characters and situations. Good job! Four stars!
Echo Emerson was one of the "popular" girls. She was an artist, she had a popular dude boyfriend. She also had divorced parents and a bipolar artist mother that her did did everything to get custody away from. Oh yeah, and Dad ended up marrying the babysitter. Two years ago, Echo's brother died in the war, and her mother snapped and tried to kill her. Echo doesn't remember the incident, but has tons of scars up her hands and arms that she can't explain. Her dad has a restraining order out on her mom, he's knocked up his new wife, and he forces Echo to take business classes instead of art. There's also the mandatory CPS therapy sessions that Echo has to go through with the new counselor at school, Mrs. Collins.
Three years ago, Noah Hutchins was a budding jock from a loving family of three boys. Then while he was out on a date, his house burned down and his parents died. Noah got thrown into foster care alone, into a series of crappy homes. After punching an abusive foster father, he now has a terrible reputation in the system and is only allowed to see his brothers occasionally under supervision. Having lost what remains of his family, he's determined to file for custody of them once he turns 18. He's also in CPS-mandated counseling at school with Mrs. Collins, who assigns Echo to tutor him (not that this happens a lot). Yes, this is kind of a "bad boy meets good girl" sort of story, but not really. Noah may smoke some joints and have a few tats, but he's clearly a good dude at heart who hasn't been able to keep up the jock rep given his changes in circumstances. He's still protective as all hell of his little brothers and his foster siblings.
Echo and Noah hit it off, adorably. He's not freaked by her scars the way her ex is, and he is totally down with being with her and helping her, and vice versa. (They have a running arrangement to try to sneak into their files if possible, which doesn't really fly.) After realizing that things can't be fixed with her old boyfriend, who is still uncomfortable with her scars and is dumb enough to drag her to a war movie, Echo gets together with Noah even if "the popular crowd" isn't cool with it. While Echo's best friend Lila stands by her, there's another so-called (more like fair weather popularity) friend Grace who will only associate with Echo if she's acting popular and dating a popular boy again. Feh on her. While Noah's foster sister Beth isn't real thrilled with Echo, she hits it off with other folks on his side.
Echo starts to remember what her mother did to her with the help of Mrs. Collins, who really does strike me as a great therapist, even if she kind of skirts the boundaries of what I suspect she's legally allowed to do. Mrs. Collins is also great backup to Noah in helping him see his brothers and figure out how to handle the situation. After finding out the truth--which is an emotional steamroller for plenty of reasons-- Echo needs to sort things out for herself on a lot of levels. It's an emotional rollercoaster of a book when it comes to the parental situations and revelations. We're pretty damn sure that Echo's dad is a jerk from the first few pages of the book--and yeah, in some ways he is--but as things go on, you understand what happened and why he does what he does. Likewise, Noah and his brothers' foster parents see each other as the enemy--Noah is convinced the kids are being abused and Carrie and Joe are hiring lawyers to keep him away--but they eventually realize that everyone's been acting with the kids' best interests at heart. While Echo's mom...okay, she's the one real villain in the piece, I have to say. But you get why Echo had fond feelings for her and misses her, when she wasn't having crazy moments.
As for the the not-so-hot bits of this book, there are not too many. There's a third act breakup--Echo and Noah somewhat reasonably assume that their relationship won't help Noah win a custody case under the circumstances--which is frustrating after awhile. And while most people in this book are developed well or fairly well in one way or another, I didn't think that Echo's best friend Lila ever stood out to me as a personality compared to everyone else. Most YA books do a good job of portraying girl-girl friendships, but Lila's importance to Echo pretty much fell by the wayside to me.
Overall, this is a very well written story, with compelling characters and situations. Good job! Four stars!
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