Can you imagine being told that you were safe from someone evil for nine years, safe long enough to grow into adulthood, to get some defenses, to heal and to hide somewhere new?
Can you imagine all of that, and then finding out after only three years that you aren’t old enough and far away enough to be safe at all?
Meredith’s mother is ecstatic that her father has an early release from prison. She’s disappointed that he can’t live with them yet, that would violate his parole, of course, but she challenged the condo association bylaws with her lawyers, and made sure to rent him a condominium identical to theirs, right down the street. Meredith’s mother has put on a perfect Size 2 red dress to welcome him home. Meredith’s mother is trying to her best to not see what’s right in front of her.
But Meredith sees. And Meredith’s busy mayor grandmother sees. And everyone in the condo association sees. And Andy, Meredith’s boyfriend, sees. All of these people are victims of Meredith’s father. And she desperately wants to run away like Andy, and not to be the sacrifice tethered to the stake, but if she lets her mother welcome her father home, and lets everyone forget what he’s done, it may not be just her and Andy next time. It will be somebody else’s kid, and somebody else’s childhood violated in blood and pain. It’s only a matter of time before it will happen again, since her father’s told her he’s always going to love her. After all, she’s Such A Pretty Girl.
But this pretty girl has a knife, and her own personal Queen of Heaven on her side.
How can she lose?
Simon & Schuster’s MTV Books brings us another gutsy, brutally honest, gut-churning older-teen novel that rings painfully true, and brings readers face to face with the power of courage.
