I'm participating in the Knee Deep by Jolene B. Perry book blog tour and I just have to say oh WOW. This book just broke me into pieces and put me back together. My feelings for it just cannot be put into words or expressed coherently and I try my best to capture how much Knee Deep has left a mark on me, but I know I fail. But I must say and I hope if you're reading this you can understand that this is a very, very moving and well written novel that I think everyone should give a chance.
Author: Jolene B. Perry
Published May 1st 2012 by Tribute Books
Genre: YA realistic contemporary, romance
Rating: ♥ ♥ ♥ ♥ ♥
Shawn is the guy Ronnie Bird promised her life to at the age of fourteen. He's her soul mate. He's more uptight every day, but it's not his fault. His family life is stressful, and she's adding to it. She just needs to be more understanding, and he'll start to be the boy she fell in love with. She won’t give up on someone she’s loved for so long.Racquel's thoughts:
Luke is her best friend, and the guy she hangs with to watch girlie movies in her large blanketopias. He's the guy she can confide in before she even goes to her girlfriends, and the guy who she's playing opposite in Romeo and Juliet. Now her chest flutters every time he gets too close. This is new. Is Ronnie falling for him? Or is Juliet? The lines are getting blurry, but leaving one guy for another is not something that a girl like Ronnie does.
Shawn’s outbursts are starting to give her bruises, and Luke’s heart breaks as Ronnie remains torn. While her thoughts and feelings swirl around the lines between friendship and forever, she’s about to lose them both.
Reading Knee Deep is like watching a train wreck in extreme slow motion. From the summary of the book you know disaster will happen and knowing from page one that it was coming just broke me. The entire time I was reading Knee Deep there was literally a weight in my heart that was pulling it down and so many times I had to put my Kindle down and just take a breath because my chest was physically hurting. But each time I picked my Kindle up again, it got worse, the train was approaching the wreck part and it just... hurt. But I just could not turn away from the crash. Or the aftermath.
In Knee Deep, Jolene B. Perry tackles the subject of an abusive relationship (don't worry, this is not a spoiler, you know there is an abusive relationship form the book summary) and I think she handled it beyond well. I was never in abusive relationship and I hope I never will be but I've stood by a very close friend who has been an abusive relationship and I think Perry handled the subject very realistically, it was liking living through what my friend went through once again. Ronnie, the main character, is with Shawn who she believes is her soul mate and even though Shawn is changing from the sweet guy she knows, she's sticking with him. No mater how much it mentally and psychically hurts. Ronnie's reaction to everything happening and even everybody's reaction around her is spot on accurate just like like with everything else with the book like the character's voices.
What made Knee Deep such a powerful novel, I believe is the fact that it wasn't overly dramatic. Bad things happened subtly but they kept piling up until I couldn't handle it anymore and I just wanted to scream at how unfair everything is. Another thing is often between chapters, we got flashbacks of Ronnie and Shawn. Shawn as a sweetheart and caring person. Shawn as a good person. So seeing him transform throughout the book was so heartbreaking and made everything worse for me. Since Shawn ran hot and cold, we got to see a sincerely good, teenage boy side of him and that made his ugly side even more... personal and hurtful since I knew he had goodness in him.
Which leads me to say that Shawn is my favorite character or better yet, the character I'm most interested in. Seeing him transform into a... monster is what ruined me the most and I just cannot stop thinking about is there room for redemption for him? Will he become a bigger abuser or will he turn his life around? Was he that effected by the bad things?
As you can see, I'm highly moved by Knee Deep. All the characters and situations felt real to me and I'm a little attached and it's definitely a book that will stay with me for a long time because even though it showed an ugly truth, a terrible, terrible truth, it also showed the light at the end of the tunnel. Hope. I would love to reread the book again, but it will extremely hard. Ronnie is a sweet girl that deserved none of the bad stuff that happened to her. Shawn transformation was heartbreaking but no matter how bad everything got, Luke and Mindy, Ronnie's best friends, were her lifeline of hope. Ronnie's dad presence in the book was great and I appreciated his important role. Also, Ronnie is participating in her school production of Romeo and Juliet and I found that a really nice addition to the story with how it was written and woven into the plot.
Another thing worth mentioning is how I really, really, really loved how the title, Knee Deep, was actually significant to the book. You're going to have to read to find out ;D
Knee Deep is not an 'good' novel. It is not an enjoyable one either. It's a novel that will deliver punch after punch and will keep you up at night and it will crush and hurt your heart but it was completely worth reading. If you don't like books that deal with hard stuff then Knee Deep isn't for you but if you want a book to evoke every emotion from you, to completely exhaust you and wear you out then put you back together, then Knee Deep went above an beyond. Despite it being extremely heartbreaking, Knee Deep, still managed to make me laugh a few times and the end was satisfying. I highly, highly suggest Knee Deep to everyone because it deals with a difficult subject and it deals with it perfectly. Jolene B. Perry wowed me.
Rating: 5 extremely heartbroken hearts~ this such a well written book that I absolutely loved. In a different kind of love but it was soooo worth reading and I cannot stress how good it is.
First:
Guilt pricks at my chest as I lie in bed and listen for Shawn's motorcycle.
Favorite:
"Why don't you think about being your own person for a while?
Teaser:
Jolene grew up in Wasilla, Alaska. She
graduated from Southern Utah University with a degree in
political science and French, which she used to teach math to
middle schoolers.
After living in Washington, Utah and Las Vegas, she now resides in Alaska with her husband, and two children. Aside from writing, Jolene sews, plays the guitar, sings when forced, and spends as much time outside as possible.
She is also the author of Night Sky, The Next Door Boys and other novels.
"Feel safe here?"
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About Jolene B. Perry:
Jolene grew up in Wasilla, Alaska. She
graduated from Southern Utah University with a degree in
political science and French, which she used to teach math to
middle schoolers.After living in Washington, Utah and Las Vegas, she now resides in Alaska with her husband, and two children. Aside from writing, Jolene sews, plays the guitar, sings when forced, and spends as much time outside as possible.
She is also the author of Night Sky, The Next Door Boys and other novels.
I also want to give a shout out to Nicole at Tribute books who is an absolute pleasure to work with :D
