Category: Self-Harm

Book Review: Girl in Pieces by Kathleen Glasgow

~ erucchii ~ 1 Comment

24879132Title:  Girl In Pieces
Author: Kathleen Glasgow
Publisher: Delacorte Press
Published: 30th August 2016
Source: Own copy
Date read: 4th January – 7th January 2017
Rating: 5 / 5 stars
Summary:

Charlotte Davis is in pieces. At seventeen she’s already lost more than most people lose in a lifetime. But she’s learned how to forget. The broken glass washes away the sorrow until there is nothing but calm. You don’t have to think about your father and the river. Your best friend, who is gone forever. Or your mother, who has nothing left to give you.

Every new scar hardens Charlie’s heart just a little more, yet it still hurts so much. It hurts enough to not care anymore, which is sometimes what has to happen before you can find your way back from the edge.

book-review

I am a masochist for going through this beautiful, mental torture. Seriously, it was mentally exhausting, which is why it took me three days to read it. But at the end of the day, it was so worth it.

Going into the story, after reading the summary, I thought it was about a girl cutting herself (I was right about that one), and set in high school — she was bullied, and met with friends and support group that helped through it. But the most important thing was, the main character herself worked to get through whatever things that she had to go through. But meh, I was wrong. The book was much more than that. It was a coming of age book, and self-discovery, in a way.

There was so much hype surrounding this book, and I tried not to keep my expectations so high, in case I was disappointed. But it turned out I didn’t have to worry about that at all. The book was well-written, and it was so beautiful, and realistic. I felt like I was there too, experiencing all the clusterfuck that Charlie had to go through. I felt so damn sad reading it, that when I am not ugly sobbing, it left me feeling choked as I read page after page.

To sum it up, if you need a book, a realistic, well-written and beautiful story that will make you cry so hard, this is your book. If you want a book that tells you that only YOU can change your life, that you can ask for help, but it’s only if you make the effort that your life will change, well, then this is your book. I think fans of Aristotle and Dante Discovers the Secrets of the Universe by Benjamin Alire Sáenz, Fans of the Impossible Life by Kate Scelsa, Every Exquisite Thing by Matthew Quick, and Am I Normal Yet by Holly Bourne would really enjoy this book.

I bet you’re wondering why, when none of the books I’ve listed out involved cutting. Well, they have something else in common. And it’s not the mental illness issue. It’s about making the readers feel like everything’s going to get ugly when the shit hits the fan with all the clusterfuck, and the despair, and everything gets worse before it gets better. That is what these books have in common, and that is why I think they’ll enjoy reading Girl In Pieces.

I rate this book 5/5 stars.