Book Thoughts: Glimpse

Title: Glimpse
Author: Carol Lynch Williams

Glimpse is absolutely wonderful. It's 484 pages long, but it's written in verse so in terms of word count it's probably pretty short. I read it over about an hour and a half. It's a quick read and an amazing book so please don't let the length scare you off.

Hope is 13. Her older sister Lizzie is 14. They have other friends, but ever since they were 3 and 4, they've been best friends and they've protected each other. So when Hope walks into their shared bedroom to find Lizzie pointing a gun at her own head and Lizzie gets shipped off to a mental hospital, Hope's world turns upside down. She doesn't understand why her sister would want to die. She doesn't understand what she's supposed to do now that she can't protect Lizzie anymore.

Hope's mother is not exactly a source of comfort; it seems like Lizzie has always been her favorite, but neither one of them was planned, and Momma hasn't really been there for the girls since their father died eight years ago. What Momma does have is a secret, and that secret may explain why Lizzie wanted so desperately "to leave/for good."

Glimpse was beautifully written and once you start reading it you just can't stop. Absolutely a must-read. So, so good. It was excellent. Both of the girls are incredibly relatable and real. Their problems don't make them any less normal girls. Hope's interactions with her best friend were always a lot of fun to read. And the writing is just spectacular. I really loved all of the poems and everything. This was a really, really awesome book. Definitely recommended.

Book Thoughts: Living Dead Girl

Title: Living Dead Girl
Author: Elizabeth Scott

I read a book today. Over the course of less than three and a half hours. Most of that time was not spent reading. In fact, I spent just a little over an hour reading it. It doesn't take long. It's a very quick read. And it was an excellent, if haunting, book.

LIVING DEAD GIRL is about Alice. Once upon a time, her name wasn't Alice. But ever since Ray took her five years ago, she has been Alice. The once-upon-a-time girl is gone.

Ray is a pedophile. He took Alice from a class trip right before her tenth birthday, and since then he has claimed to be her father figure, but basically she's his sex toy. She's broken; she doesn't know how to be anything other than Ray's little girl. But Alice is fifteen now, and that's too old for Ray. Ray wants a new Alice. And this Alice is going to help him get her, because if she isn't good, the once-upon-a-time girl's family will be killed. Ray will kill them.

From the back of the book:

"The thing is, you can get used to anything. You think you can't, you want to die, but you don't. You won't. You just are."
This is Alice. She was taken by Ray five years ago. She thought she knew how her story would end. She was wrong.

Not gonna lie, it was a pretty creepy/disturbing story. My recommendation for this one comes with caution labels. It's not a lighthearted story that anyone who's just looking to kill some time should read. But if you're looking for a genuinely well-written (the writing style is great), haunting story that will make you think, I would recommend LIVING DEAD GIRL in a heartbeat. It's an excellent book. One of those ones that you can't really say "I enjoyed that," because you don't enjoy reading about abuse, but it is a gripping story that you can't put down, and I would give it five stars.