After the school nurse notices the marks on her arm, Callie's dangerous habit is exposed - sending her to Sea Pines for treatment and changing her life drastically. Callie, an otherwise normal 15 year old, cuts herself in order to experience the physical pain, not because she wants to kill herself. Callie is a quiet teen who keeps all her emotions bottled up inside; her only release is cutting. At Sea Pines, she meets other teen girls with destructive habits such as drinking, drugging, or various eating disorders. Also through her group therapy, Callie meets Amanda, whose problem is similar to her own. Finally, Callie begins to open up about why she cuts herself, though the therapy does become too much at one point, causing an incident where Callie almost undoes all improvement made. To truly move past this destructive and life-threatening behavior, Callie must not only come to terms with the root of her problem, but also confront her loved ones. This is an issue that effects much more than just the cutter themselves. Callie's story takes the reader inside the mind of a self-mutilator, evoking both understanding and compassion for a too-common issue among teens.
This sounds like a great book. Unfortunately, you are correct; many teens girls (and probably boys) feel pressure from friends, school, and family, and resort to self-mutilation. Just like the book I read on eating disorders, it is important that the authors go to great lengths not to glamorize any of these behaviors.
ReplyDeleteI like that you read a book about a serious issue, like cutting, involving teen girls and teens in general. Teens who do these things feel that they are often alone in their actions like the main character Callie in this book felt until she met Amanda and the other teens with similar issues. Books like these are important for teens who do these things so that they know they aren't alone and there is a way to stop, such as the treatment this book suggests. For teens who don't do these activities, this book is also interesting because they get to see firsthand what is in the minds of teen cutters, drinkers, smokers, etc.
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