I’d been crying for at least an hour. My husband peered at me over the ever-growing mountain of used tissues. ‘Why do you read books if they’re this bad?’

‘It’s not bad,’ I sobbed. ‘It’s really, really good.’

And it is. ‘Sorta like a rock star’ by Matthew Quick will give you a hug (because Amber loves hugs), tear your heart apart with anxious little doggy teeth while you’re looking the other way, and then knit it back together. But it won’t be quite the same.

I was recommended this book by an author friend. I was expecting hope and light. Sure, I got that, but I also got some unexpected, wrenching dark. There is depth and harshness and reality that make the hope that much more powerful.

Hence the tissues…

If you have trigger issues around depression, this might not be the book for you. Otherwise, read on…

So what makes this book so enthralling?

• the voice of the main character – Amber. She thinks, acts and talks like a unique person. (True? True.) From the frigid back of a school bus, where she lives with her alcoholic mother, she is truly a hope spreader, a super-optimist. She’s funny. She’s brave. I want to give her a high-five.
• a brilliant ensemble of diverse characters whose lives have become intertwined with Amber’s. I don’t know how she gets her homework done, frankly, because her life is full of things I never dreamed of doing, or was too scared to try.

Voice + Character = Fab :o)

You may exist in

This world – but I exist too

And I will not yield.

(p348 – haiku by Amber)

 Total recommendation.

Like, if Total accidentally drank an enlarging potion and then swallowed Jupiter by mistake… that big a recommendation.

As Amber says, there are worse things in this world than hopeful misfits. Come out the other end of this book with a refreshed view of life and a greater appreciation for haiku.

Consider yourself recommended.