Leaving Paradise

Title: Leaving Paradise
Author: Simone Elkeles
(C)2007
Publisher: Flux
ISBN: 978-0-7387-1018-1
303 pp.

Is it possible to pull your life back together after you've been hurt?

What about trusting the person who hurt you?

Each person has to answer those questions for themselves when something happens in their life. I am a "keep moving forward" kind of person. So for me, the answer to that first question is a yes. That ability to pull my life back together isn't easy, but it's so deeply ingrained into my personality that I don't think I could be any other way.

For Maggie, that's a different story. She's scarred after being hit by a drunk driver and left for dead. What's worse, the drunk driver is her next door neighbor - her best friend's twin brother. At least, that's what the police report says.

This book can draw you in and make you physically hurt for Maggie and the situation she finds herself in. I found myself being annoyed and proud all at the same time as she slowly learns to push herself to be stronger. Some of it is the guidance she doesn't have at home, but all that changes when she starts working for Mrs. Reynolds to earn money to leave Paradise. (Oh! That's the name of the town.)

Meanwhile, we get to meet the drunk driver, Caleb. We learn about his year spent at the Department of Corrections (DOC) and the way his old life begins to unravel when he returns home to find nothing the same, despite his parents' desperate attempts to appear normal.

Caleb's story is a rare glimpse into what juvinile detention is like. Caleb, once a popular high school jock, is unknowingly transformed inside those walls. If he's learned one thing, it's that one mistake and your life will never be the same. What he doesn't realize until coming home, is that neither is anyone else effected by it.

So what happens when Caleb comes back into Maggie's life? Can she learn to trust him again? Can he let himself trust again?

The story ends rather abruptly. I got the sense of "where's the next page?" hanging over me when I finished it. It might bother some people, but I knew the sequel was coming out soon, so I was patient and found other things to read until then.

And now I finally have the sequel!