Book Review: Speechless

Speechless

by Hannah Harrington

Published: September 2012 by Mira Ink

Version: Ebook from publisher and Netgalley (review my own, honest opinion)

Rating: 4.5 sofas

Everyone knows that Chelsea Knot can’t keep a secret

Until now. Because the last secret she shared turned her into a social outcast—and nearly got someone killed.

Now Chelsea has taken a vow of silence—to learn to keep her mouth shut, and to stop hurting anyone else. And if she thinks keeping secrets is hard, not speaking up when she’s ignored, ridiculed and even attacked is worse.

But there’s strength in silence, and in the new friends who are, shockingly, coming her way—people she never noticed before; a boy she might even fall for. If only her new friends can forgive what she’s done. If only she can forgive herself.

I was excited to read this as I have heard nothing but good things about it. The idea seemed pretty simple; a loudmouth girl whose outbursts had serious consequences decides to take a vow of silence.

However, the story runs much deeper than that. It explores as teenagers (and adults) how easy it is to give into peer pressure. And how we convince ourselves that things we say or do aren’t really *that* bad. This book turns that all on a head, and shows that actually the little things can have dire results. And even if we might not remember it, something we say or do can have a profound effect on someone else, and therefore we should really think before we act.

The idea of taking a vow of silence baffles me. Obviously it would be totally impractical in a working day, but it is such a powerful notion in this book. It really highlights how much we rely on our voice, and different ways of expressing it. 

Although this book focusses on silence, ironically, it is also about speaking out. Chelsea is an easy target because she can’t really fight back. But does this allow her to be bullied?

Ultimately Speechless is about Chelsea’s journey of self discovery. Learning that being cool or popular doesn’t always equate with being happy. You should never have to be horrible to someone or hide your true self in order to gain friends. Asha is the personification of this; she doesn’t care what anyone else thinks. And if that means she is ignored or bullied by the ‘popular’ group, then thats okay because she is true to herself.

I fell in love with Speechless. I adore issue books and this one certainly did not disappoint. It hit me a lot deeper than I expected, with the writing both emotional and beautiful. Perfect for any teenagers, it highlights the importance of standing up for yourself and not following the crowd. Highly recommended; 4.5 sofas!  

Top Ten: Books On my Autumn TBR List

Top Ten Tuesday is a weekly meme hosted by The Broke and The Bookish. 

The topic for today is Fall’s (Autumn’s) TBR List. For October I am going to try and eliminate as many ebooks as possible from my TBR pile. I have let them build up and it is not really fair on those authors and publishers. So I am going to try and clear my conscience before the year is out….  

Acid by Emma Pass: I’ve heard such awesome things about this one, I definitely need to read it soon. 

Brooklyn Girls by Gemma Burgess: This was hailed as one of the first major NA books without sex as a major feature. 

Keeping Her by Cora Carmack: One of my favourite authors, there is no good excuse why I haven’t already read this. 

              The Kissing Booth by Beth Reekles: This sounds like a really cute contemporary and I have her second book on my shelf as well, so I need to crack on with this one. 

Speechless by Hannah Harrington: Lots of people I know adore this one. The concept sounds really interesting, but it just keeps getting pushed down my pile.  

                            

                    

There are also some print copies that I can’t wait to delve into.

Are We There Yet? by David Levithan: David Levithan, yo! Loving his books at the minute. 

Another Way to Fall by Amanda Brooke: This sounds like its gonna be very emotional, but amazing. 

Friday Brown by Vikki Wakefield: I have heard nothing but awesomeness about this one. 

Metawars series by Jeff Norton: The first three books in this series are sitting on my shelf, with the fourth to be released soon. This sci-fi adventure set will make a nice break from all the contemporaries!       

Colin Fischer by Ashley Edward Miller & Zack Stentz: This sounds like a good ‘issues’ kind of books and is lovely and thin!  

                                       

                      

That’s the plan for my reading list, but what should I read first? Leave me some recommendations! Have you read any of these before? Link me to your TTT below!   

Letterbox Love #11

Letterbox Love is a meme hosted by Lynsey of Narratively Speaking whereby book lovers can exhibit the books they received this week.

An impressive haul this week 😀 It was my birthday yesterday, so a trip to Waterstones was a must! First the library love: 

‘The Sky Is Everywhere‘ by Jandy Nelson is on my to-read list. So if I physically hold the book, there’s more chance of me reading it….right? This is the only book I collected this week as I am trying very hard to get my library pile down!

Now for ebooks! I was extremely excited to get my first Edelweiss acceptance this week, and it seems HarperCollins must love me! I got accepted for ‘Period 8‘ by Chris Crutcher, ‘Mila 2.0‘ by Debra Driza, ‘Pivot Point‘ by Kasie West and ‘Pretty Girl-13‘ by Liz Coley. All four are books I have heard lots about and sound AMAZING so I am extremely grateful! I had to resist starting Mila 2.0 last night, as I have a couple of others that need to come first. Much much love for Harper Collins though, as this was a wonderful gift. *Swoons*

         

Thanks to Netgalley and Harlequin for ‘Speechless‘ by Hannah Harrington. It feels like this book has been on my to-read list FOREVER so I was really pleased to get this. It sounds very gripping, and I’m sure I will devour it! 

I was also quite shocked to get accepted for ‘Warm Bodies‘ by Isaac Marion. Thanks to Netgalley and Random House. I was a bit unsure about this one but there is a lot of hype so it made me intrigued. I never usually get accepted by Random House so it is much appreciated!

And now for the ones I bought! This is quite bad of me, but there are soooooo many new books out there that I want to read, and many that my local library doesn’t have. In my defence, I got some in the sale, and most of the others were buy one, get one half price. I had no choice! So here are the ones I bought yesterday:

Yay for John Green! I adored ‘A Fault in Their Stars’, so I grabbed the opportunity to read another of his novels. And the cover for ‘Looking For Alaska‘ is so pretty! I had a bit of a dilemma between this and ‘an Abundance of Katherines’, but I hope I made the right choice. I also picked up ‘City of Shadows‘ by Alex Scarrow (Time Riders 6) as I have some of the other Timeriders so this will go nicely with my collection.

I also took advantage of this trip to pick up ‘Love Virtually‘ by Daniel Glattauer. I am totally in love with this book, and its sequel ‘Every Seventh Wave, which I reviewed earlier this week here. I implore you to read it!

Two that I picked up that I haven’t read before are ‘From What I Remember‘ by Stacy Kramer and Valerie Thomas and ‘Partials‘ by Dan Wells. The first just sounded really fun, a good beach read, and like it might have some laughs too! Conversely, I wanted ‘Partials’ as it sounded like a good dystopian novel. And I think you can never have too many of them in your life! 

Never ending books, hehe. ‘Second Chance Summer‘ by Morgan Matson was I book I was/am really looking forward to. I love reading books about illness and such things, especially YA, so this is really up my street. I chose ‘Geekhood: Close Encounters of the Girl Kind‘ by Andy Robb firstly for its quirky cover, and because its always fun to read a boy’s perspective on girls. I think everyone should read books once in a while that make them smile, and this looks like that type of book!

Finally ‘Before I Die‘ by Jenny Downham (already read), ‘Perfect Chemistry‘ by Simone Elkeles and ‘Perfect Match‘ by Jodi Picoult because who can resist a bargain! Yay for sale books! And because of my book buying excellence, a £10 voucher from the lovely people at Waterstones for spending so much money. What an excuse to buy more books…. 

What did you receive this week? Have you read any of my books and do you think it should be at the top or the bottom of my to read pile? I’d love to hear from you!