She doesn't speak when she introduces Sam to Poet's Corner, and she never reads her poems aloud, as the rest of the kids do.

When Sam realizes who he is, and what she did to him, she enlists Caroline's help to write a poem that expresses her sorrow for what she had done to him.Ĭaroline, a good friend and constant source of support, is an odd duck. AJ doesn't trust her, but grudgingly allows her to stay in Poet's Corner for just one day. In Poet's Corner, Sam meets AJ, a boy she bullied so mercilessly with her friends when they were younger that he was forced to move to another middle school.

In a nice visual, the poems are written on scraps of paper and glued to the wall after they're performed, creating a tactile sea of paper lining the room. A hipster-ish girl named Caroline, whose locker is in the same bank of lockers with Sam's, introduces her to Poet's Corner, a secret club in a secret room beneath the school's theater, where kids gather to write poetry and read aloud to each other. It's probably the most organic part of her illness, in terms of how the author, Tamara Ireland Stone, writes.Īt the start of the new year, Sam wants to break free of her old friends but doesn't know how. Throughout the book, Sam is constantly thinking-her inability to be mentally restful is well done. Sam has a good relationship with her psychiatrist, Shrink-Sue, and takes medication both for her condition and to help her sleep at night-sleep is difficult because of her racing thoughts. Thus, Samantha hides her OCD from her friends, only feeling comfortable in her skin when she's in the pool with her best 'summer' friend, Cassidy. Now their friendship causes her anxiety, but she's afraid of the alternative of being alone and starting over.

Being part of this Mean Girl group happened somewhat by chance for Sam, since their friendship began in kindergarten, when they all had a warmer, more genuine relationship. In school she's Samantha, and part of the popular clique of girls who call themselves the Crazy Eights. As Sam, she's a swimmer with a wholesome family who also happens to have the 'obsessive-thoughts' form of obsessive compulsive disorder, which was diagnosed when she was ten. Samantha, who prefers 'Sam,' leads two lives. One-sentence summary: This is an easy read with a respectful treatment of mental illness and a refreshingly healthy family for the protagonist, but it's more of a thoughtful, positive introduction to-rather than a complex look at-obsessive compulsive disorder. ***Note: this review assumes that you've read the book.***

Every last word romance