Review: Dancing with Molly by Lena Horowitz

Dancing with Molly by Lena Horowitz

Before, I was never the life of the party. I was the reliable one. The one no one had to worry about. The one no one had to think about. I was the one that everyone could ignore.
Until that night, when everything changed and I finally became someone.
Someone special.
Someone noticeable.
Someone Carson might actually care about, as much as I cared about him.
But the cost of being someone is more than anyone can imagine. For every moment, there’s a price to pay. For every party. For every choice made. For every kiss.
Ultimately, living a life of PURE ECSTASY might be no different from not living at all.

Publishes in US: June 2nd 2015 by Simon Pulse
Genre: YA contemp (has drug use)
Source: Simon Teen via edelweiss
Series? no

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    I wanted to read Dancing with Molly because I can relate with that all American normal feeling. I have always felt like I can just melt into a crowd, that there isn't much that distinguishes me from others, or worse, that I may be the butt of a joke. So I could relate with her on that. 

   Although I normally want to get to know the character before something big happens that changes their lives, Dancing with Molly was okay for me to start in the after. She is writing in a journal but it never felt forced to me, or hard to read. I honestly just felt like a normal past tense 1st person POV. Which is good, because sometimes the journals or poetry isn't for me and gets in my way of enjoying a story.

   Her family is talked about a lot. She feels like she is a disappointment to her Mom who favors her sister. Her sister is going to the prom as a sophomore, and will giggle and share secrets with her mom, but she always feels like her Mom wishes a different life or personality for her. I was glad that her dad was enthusiastic about her marching band though, and that she at least seemed to have that haven. 

    I liked her friends, even though they are in on taking the drugs and drinking as well. They never pressured her per say, but she was definitely a follower, and on the night she first took it, she wanted to break out from the normalness. 

   Oh and this is not a subject I really know much about, and to prove it to you, I thought that molly was the name of the main character for an embarrassingly long percentage of the book. 

   I did like how by the ending, she has realized a lot about rolling and the cost of it, and I even think that it went to a bit of an extreme after the close calls she witnessed but I guess that it finally got heavy and hard enough for her to want to stop. And I think that probably makes it realistic, because if all people who have tried or are thinking about trying  to stop or didn't do drugs because of close calls, then we would have a drug free nation. 

Bottom Line: Allure and dangers of taking drugs from a teen easy to relate to.

My question to you, my lovely readers:
Were you life of the party or reliable one? Or somewhere else on spectrum?