To everyone who knows him, West Ashby has always been that guy: the cocky, popular, way-too-handsome-for-his-own-good football god who led Lawton High to the state championships. But while West may be Big Man on Campus on the outside, on the inside he’s battling the grief that comes with watching his father slowly die of cancer.

Two years ago, Maggie Carleton’s life fell apart when her father murdered her mother. And after she told the police what happened, she stopped speaking and hasn’t spoken since. Even the move to Lawton, Alabama, couldn’t draw Maggie back out. So she stayed quiet, keeping her sorrow and her fractured heart hidden away.

As West’s pain becomes too much to handle, he knows he needs to talk to someone about his father—so in the dark shadows of a post-game party, he opens up to the one girl who he knows won’t tell anyone else.

West expected that talking about his dad would bring some relief, or at least a flood of emotions he couldn’t control. But he never expected the quiet new girl to reply, to reveal a pain even deeper than his own—or for them to form a connection so strong that he couldn’t ever let her go…

Abbi Glines has done it again!!! She has brought us a story that will melt your heart and leave you breathless.  I have to admit, I requested to review this book solely based on two things:

The beautiful cover

And

The fact that Abbi Glines wrote it.

I never read the synopsis so I really had no idea what is was about.  This book sucked me in from the very beginning and at times left me a snotty, puffy red eyed mess.  I had no idea the emotions it would bring out of me.  Yes this takes place in high school and may be considered young adult, but it deals with situations that could affect anyone at any age.  West and Maggie are phenomenal, complex characters.  West is a high school football star that is privately dealing with his father’s terminal cancer and Maggie has gone through things that no teenage girl should and has become mute because of it.  The two of them together make for such an emotional book and I never knew which way the story would end.  Two damaged souls trying to heal make for one incredible story.

5 Stars

♥ Sophie

Abbi Glines is a #1 New York Times, USA Today, and Wall Street Journal bestselling author of the Rosemary Beach, Sea Breeze, Vincent Boys, and Existence series. She has a new YA series coming out in the fall of 2015 titled The Field Party Series . She never cooks unless baking during the Christmas holiday counts. She believes in ghosts and has a habit of asking people if their house is haunted before she goes in it. She drinks afternoon tea because she wants to be British but alas she was born in Alabama. When asked how many books she has written she has to stop and count on her fingers. When she’s not locked away writing, she is reading, shopping (major shoe and purse addiction), sneaking off to the movies alone, and listening to the drama in her teenagers lives while making mental notes on the good stuff to use later. Don’t judge