Review: Beautiful by Amy Reed

Beautiful by Amy Reed

Release Date: October 6th, 2009

Number of Pages: 232

Publisher: Simon Pulse

Source: Bought

When Cassie moves from the tiny town where she has always lived to a suburb of Seattle, she is determined to leave her boring, good-girl existence behind. This is Cassie’s chance to stop being invisible and become the kind of girl who’s worth noticing.

 Stepping into her new identity turns out to be easier than Cassie could have ever imagined… one moment, one choice, changes everything.  

Cassie’s new existence both thrills and terrifies her. Swept into a world of illicit parties and social landmines, she sheds her virginity, embraces the numbness she feels from the drugs, and floats through it all, knowing that she is now called beautiful. She ignores the dangers of her fast-paced life… but she can’t sidestep the secrets and the cruelty.

 Cassie is trapped in a swift downward spiral tinged with violence and abuse, and no one—not even the one person she thought she could trust—can help her now.

Am I the only one who thought this book was similar to the movie Thirteen, with Nikki Reed and Evan Rachel Woods? There was something in it that really reminded me of this movie. After all, Cassie goes from being a good girl, to being a ‘bad” girl, caught in a world of lies, drug, sex, alcohol and abuse.

This is not a light read, that’s for sure. There is something really troubling in reading about a thirteen-years-old going through all Cassie is going through. Your heart breaks while reading everything she is faced with, everything she does to leave her good girl images she seems to loathe at first. It’s really hard to stop reading, as you’re aching for her life to go easier. Most of her descent to hell starts when she meets Alex, the ‘bad’ girl of her school. She’s the one that introduce her to most of the drugs, alcohol and sex. I have to say that couldn’t believe this character (not as in ‘she’s unbelievable”, but more like “how can she do something like that AT THAT AGE!!”). Sarah, on the other end, was a character I wish Cassie could have spent more time with. I really wanted to know more about her. There was something heartbreaking about her too.

This book left me wondering were the world is going. Is it what we should expect for the future generation? Starting drugs, sex, alcohol and lies so young? That’s the one thing that really me unsure about the book. The fact that Cassie is only thirteen was really troubling, especially because I have cousins coming to that age. Amy Reed really took the story to the limit; never being shy of really describing what is going on. I wouldn’t recommend this book to a younger audience, as some aspect can be a little explicit for the thirteen-years-old that I know.