Title CleanReview
Author Mia Kerick
Release Date December 1, 2015
Tour Host Sage's Blog Tours
High school senior Lanny Keating has it all. A three-sport athlete at Lauserville High School looking at a college football scholarship, with a supportive family, stellar grades, boy band good looks… until the fateful day when it all falls apart.
Seventeen-year-old Trevor Ladd has always been a publicly declared zero and the high school badboy. Abandoned by his mother and sexually abused by his legal guardian, Trevor sets his sights on mere survival.
Lanny seeks out Trevor’s companionship to avoid his shattered home life. Unwilling to share their personal experiences of pain, the boys explore ways to escape, leading them into sexual experimentation, and the abuse of illegal drugs and alcohol. Their mutual suffering creates a lasting bond of friendship and love.
When the time finally comes to get clean and sober, or flunk out of high school, only one of the boys will graduate, while the other spirals downward into addiction. Will Lanny and Trevor find the strength to battle their demons of mind-altering substances as well as emotional vulnerability?
Clean takes the reader on a gritty trip into the real and raw world of teenage substance abuse.
Clean provides a raw look at how tragedy can fuel teenage substance abuse. It isn't an easy read, but it is a good one. Trigger warnings: substance abuse, sexual abuse
The book is broken up into two parts. I'd like to think of it as a before and after of sorts. While the first part is gritty and painful, the second part provides a powerful message of hope and redemption for Trevor and Lanny.
I was a bit put off by the writing style in the beginning. At times the internal dialogue didn't feel as genuine and realistic as the rest of the book. However, by the end of the book, I grew to enjoy it.
Rating
4 out of 5 stars
* This book was received from the author in exchange for an honest review. *
Excerpt from Clean
About the Author
Ms Kerick is the mother of four exceptional children—all named after saints—and five non-pedigreed cats—all named after the next best thing to saints, Boston Red Sox players. Her husband of twenty-three years has been told by many that he has the patience of Job, but don’t ask Mia about that, as it’s a sensitive subject.
Mia focuses her stories on the emotional growth of troubled young people and their relationships. As a teen, Mia filled spiral- bound notebooks with romantic tales of tortured heroes (most of whom happened to strongly resemble lead vocalists of 1980s big- hair bands) and stuffed them under her mattress for safekeeping.
She is thankful to CoolDudes Publishing, Dreamspinner Press, Harmony Ink Press, and CreateSpace for providing her with alternate places to stash her stories.
Mia is a social liberal and cheers for each and every victory made in the name of human rights, especially marital equality, which is now the law of the land in the United States—woot! woot! Her only major regret: never having taken typing or computer class in school, destining her to a life consumed with two-fingered pecking and constant prayer to the Gods of Technology.
Author Links
Website
Thank you for hosting me on your blog today and for your excellent review of Clean!!
ReplyDelete