Pink Polka Dot Books: What She Left Behind By Tracy Bilen

What She Left Behind

Sara's brother committed suicide and now Sara's mother tells her they are finally leaving her abusive father. She tells her to pack a bag and that she'll pick her up at school during lunch.

Only her mother never shows. And when she gets home that evening her father is sitting in the dark, alone. He tells her that her mom went out of town for work... INSTANT PANIC!!!!

Does this mean he found out about the plan? Or did her mother just tell him that so she could go get things set up for them somewhere? Sara chooses to believe the latter because otherwise her mother must be dead.

She goes through the next week hoping upon hope that her phone will ring and it will be her mom.... it never is. She tries to keep the guy that's crushing on her at arms length because she doesn't want to involve him in her mess... but that's kind of hard when he's so wonderful.

The more time passes the more panicked she feels and the less the chances that her mom will ever come home. With her dad being BFF's with the police in town, she knows her only option is to figure things out for herself...

This book!! It was part mystery, part heartbreaking abuse story, and part romance.

I just loved the M/C. She was so in denial, yet she was really smart and actually had great instincts. I loved how she twirled her ponytail, played in the band, and could come up with answers for everything. She wasn't afraid to lie to whoever to get to the truth about her mom... even if she kind of already knew the truth and just didn't want to believe it.

Alex was too cute! I thought it was nice to see a guy come on so strong to a girl, but in a nice way. He liked Sara and made it known. This why I love YA... High School love is awesome! Also, his side story made him super likable.

I definitely could've used a smidge more in the ending *SPOILER* I don't want Sara to live her life feeling guilty about what she did for the rest of her life, she doesn't deserve that!

Overall: I LOVED it... I love a book that makes me fly through it because I want to know all the answers!! What a great debut novel, can't wait to read more by this author!

How I got this book: I own it! Yay!
Date Published: 5/1/2012
Publisher: Simon Pulse

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