Read Between The Lines Review

Goodreads

TITLE: Read Between The Lines

AUTHOR: Jo Knowles

PUBLISHER: Candlewick Press
PUBLICATION DATE: 3/10/2015

FORMAT: ARC

PAGES: 336

SOURCE: Amazon Vine

MY RATING:

BACK COVER SUMMARY: Unpopular Nate suffers a broken finger courtesy of a bully in gym class. The middle one--splinted to flip off the world. It won't be the last time that finger is raised in this extraordinary novel. Dreams Claire envisions herself sitting in a cafe, filling a journal with her thoughts--but fate has other plans. One cheerleader dates a closeted basketball star; another questions just how, as a "big girl," she fits in. A group of boys scam clueless drivers for beer money without remorse--or so it seems.

Their voices--and many others--speak of the complex dance that is life in a small town. These characters orbit one another, trying to understand and be understood in the face of trauma, heartbreak, and revenge. The line where presentation and perception meet can be hard to discern. Unless, of course, one can look a little closer--and read between the lines.

OVERALL IMPRESSION: This book is made up of many many different perspectives. I like how all of the stories are intertwined, but we don't see them collide all at once, we see things unfold slowly throughout the story. It makes you think about how people are always interspersed in each other's lives and how we are all connected in some way or another, even if we don't realize the impact we may have on other people. This book is a very small snippet of time for this community and it was really interesting to read about.

CHARACTERS: The book gives the perspectives of ten different characters. Because the book is so short and there are so many characters, I feel like I didn't really get to know any of them as deeply as I would have liked. But I also feel that this story is more about the community as a whole than any one individual character, so it works for this book.

COVER: The cover is pretty simplistic, which is a feature I like in covers. It ties in well with the story.

**I received and ARC of this book from Amazon Vine for my honest review.**