Review: In Too Deep by Amanda Grace

In Too Deep by Amanda Grace

From the author of "But I Love Him" comes a haunting novel about what happens to one teenage girl when a rumor of rape goes around her school. A Junior Library Guild Selection.

Published in US: Feb 8th 2012
Source: Flux

My Review:

    This is such a unique idea for a story! Amanda writes with such emotion and her characters are always deep and have characteristics that are so easy to relate to, even if we aren't in their exact situation. She makes it so that the rumor snowballing is so easy to believe and the circumstances leading up to it are a perfect storm. It really is a picture of what can happen when you tell a lie, which I know I did some as a teenager, some of almost as epic proportions to letting people believe that Carter raped Sam, although mine didn't quite have the same repurcusions as letting people believe that a guy raped you when he didn't, no matter what a jerk he might be.
    I guess that I can understand how Sam let it go on, but I just kept crossing my fingers that she would own up and time after time, she didn't. But I really think that she should've seen what would happen to her relationship with Nick if she didn't tell the truth right away but did later.
   Speaking of Nick, I really enjoyed their friendship at the beginning. It seemed so much fun and I like to see that sort of comradery with guys and girls without it being romantic. But I guess I saw it coming because of the way she said she started thinking of him differently. Though I have to say friends to a relationship really can work out beautifully in real life when done right, because that is how me and my husband were.
   I want to applaud Ms. Grace for letting the ending play out the way it did. I think that given the nature of the book that it really couldn't have happened any other way. 

Pin It

Review: But I Love Him by Amanda Grace

But I Love Him by Amanda Grace

Tonight was so much worse than anything before it. Tonight he didn't stop after the first slap.

At the beginning of senior year, Ann was a smiling, straight-A student and track star with friends and a future. Then she met a haunted young man named Connor. Only she can heal his emotional scars; only he could make her feel so loved — and needed. Ann can't recall the pivotal moment it all changed, when she surrendered everything to be with him, but by graduation, her life has become a dangerous high wire act. Just one mistake could trigger Connor's rage, a senseless storm of cruel words and violence damaging everything — and everyone — in its path.

This evocative slideshow of flashbacks reveals a heartbreaking story of love gone terribly wrong.

Published in US: Aug 2011
Source: Library

My review:

      On one hand, I really enjoyed and sped through But I Love Him, but on the other, I still have reservations.
   I think that the positive part is definitely the winner though because this is an issue that is near to my heart, and it is really hard to tackle it in a way that will suit everyone. But a book like this has a very powerful message that women all around need to hear and remember. It's easy to say, that's where I would walk away... but it's not that simple. And the way that Ms. Hubbard/Grace did it in reverse order, where it wasn't so easy to pin an exact moment that the reader can point to, because when you're in it, in love, that moment is just as unclear.
   I really like the character of Abby, it is the definition of a true friend, and I like the characterization of Ann. Sometimes we have the kick ass heroines, and it's good to admire that, but I think that Ann is more of what you find in real life--with real strengths, and with all too real weaknesses.