I truly enjoyed the book as it dealt with the issues in an honest and open manner. Paige has her senior year all planned out for herself but at the end of her junior year, a drunk driving accident occurs and her plans are trashed. As a reader, you don’t find out the whole details of the incident until the end of the book but small details are scattered throughout the story and as a reader you piece the puzzle together. Paige, Lacey and Nikki dreams were to be homecoming queens together and these dreams had been planned for years. Their senior year was going to be the best! After the accident, Paige is carted away to Paris to be a nanny for the summer, Lacey undergoes therapy at the hospital and Nikki, well her life is shrinking away, literally. When Paige returns, the threesome is not what they used to be. Paige seems so confused at this part in her life. Where does she fit in? Her mother has always had this mold for her as the perfect person that makes you want to scream and this mold continues upon her return back to Iowa. Her friends have been living the summer without her and think her time in Paris was a vacation and Paige just wants to pretend that nothing major has happened. Add to the drama of Paige’s boyfriend Jake, who has been taking care of Lacey and you have more drama than this book can hold. As school starts, a creative class helps Paige but she must learn to let go and be herself. What the future holds for this group of seniors depends on what’s inside each of them.Living in Iowa, I enjoyed reading about the references to places in Iowa and reminisced with some of the events that the individuals did. The truck stop scavenger hunt was comical and just like every tourist stop you see around the U.S., you find quite a variety of unique items that highlight your state. The characters emotions and drama felt real and although the book was a long one, the pages flew by. There were times that I had to put the book down as I felt so overcome with emotions that I just had to stop. I felt there was some promiscuous activities taking place in the book and hoped that someone would put a stop to that. I would hope that with the information that is available out in society, something would be done to curb that behavior. This is a wonderful coming of age story. “I thought too much: that was my problem. What I needed to do was relax, take a deep breath, maybe get another drink, and kick it with the people around me, people who, if not true friends, were at least a comfortable and easy group to be a part of: High school was for having fun, after all.”This book contains sexual content and explicit language.
