Skip to main content

Every Last Word by Tamara Ireland Stone (Fiction)

16 year old Samantha is perfect.  She is the best swimmer and is part of the Crazy Eights, the most popular group in the whole school.  However, being perfect comes with a cost.  Samantha suffers with extreme OCD causing her to spiral. So as her so called friends start to bully her, she feels she doesn’t have the strength to fight back and stand up for herself. But during her darkest moment she befriends a mysterious and quiet girl named Caroline, who leads her to a secret club of misfits, outcasts and artist called Poet's Corner. There she feels finally free and is able to control her OCD, but is faced with a problem, should she reveal her OCD to the world and find the courage to leave the Crazy Eights or should she continue living a lie?

Every word in this book is about finding the courage to be your own person and showing kindness toward others. There is a great example of this when Caroline accepts Samantha for who she is even though she is one of the popular people who usually picked on Caroline and her friends. Even though there is a difference in the way they live and who they hang out with, they both find comfort in each other. In the book Samantha is struggling with her identity, as her so called friends start to leave her out.  For Samantha or otherwise known as Sam, this is almost life changing showing that even a small thing like saying hello in the cafeteria can really affect someone in a positive way. As shown with Sam and Caroline all it took for them was a small hello.  
I highly recommend this book as a good summer read to all.
Reviewed by Maren K., 8th

Popular posts from this blog

Prodigy by Marie Lu

Prodigy by Marie Lu is the second book to a dystopian young adult book series titled Legend. The series follows the story of June Iparis and Day in the new America, which is split between the Republic and the Colonies. June, a sixteen-year-old girl who scored a perfect score on her trial and was born into an elite republic family. Her life has been planned perfectly since the day she was born. Day is a sixteen-year-old boy who lives an opposite life of June. He is fugitive who is currently hiding out from the Republic in the streets of Los Angeles. After the first book, June and Day are currently on the run from The Republic. After Day’s brother pretends to be Day to save his life, he dies, leaving the Republic to believe that Day is dead. While June and Day are injured and on the run with targets on their back, they seek to find an alliance with the Patriots- a rebellious group whose mission is to shut down the Republic and to kill the new elector. As Day and June venture outside of L...
Read more

Every Last Word by Tamara Ireland Stone (Realistic Fiction)

In the book Evert Last Word, the main character Samantha explored the struggle of having mental illnesses as a teenage girl in high school. She has always kept these mental illnesses from her friends because she was scared of what they would think. Her mind is constantly filled with dark thoughts and worries that she can’t let go off or turn off. Daily life is a struggle because she constantly questions her every action, idea, and statement. It also doesn't help that her lifelong friends will become toxic at the first sign of a wrong outfit, wrong lunch, or wrong crush. Samantha is aware that it would be insane for her to leave the safety of the most well-liked students. Samantha feels a strong attraction to Caroline as soon as they meet. Caroline stands out from the crowd because she doesn't wear makeup and doesn't care what people think of her appearance. Her lack of judgment and focus solely on friendship is like a breath of fresh air. Samantha meets up with some of Caro...
Read more