Just Jennifer

Save Yourself by Kelly Braffet (Crown, August 2013)

Patrick Cusimano’s father is in jail after a drunken driving accident that killed a first-grader.  Patrick and his brother Mike think they are now doing the best they can: Mike is working at a warehouse and his moved his new girlfriend Caro into the house; Patrick is working the overnight at the crumbier convenience store in town.  Patrick, the one who finally called the police on his father, is taking things more to heart than Mike, especially after Layla Elshere, a goth teenager walks into his life and tries to befriend him.  Layla’s father is a charismatic minister and is not pleased with the way Layla has been conducting herself.  Layla’s younger sister Verna, a freshman in high school has become the target of some very cruel classmates and Verna is afraid to turn them in after the to-do that ensued when her father learned a biology teacher was teaching sex ed.  As she tries to insulate herself against the cruel treatment she is receiving, Verna finds herself drawn to Layla’s circle of friends who, while protective of Verna grown even darker and ever more dangerous as time passes.

Damaged characters populate this novel and readers watch helplessly as bad choices are made and hopelessness becomes accepted and the feeling that “this is my reality, deal with it” sets in.  As the title suggests, some characters can be saved while others are beyond redemption, but some are innocent bystanders who get caught up in the fervor of it all.  The book beings and ends with a tragedy and in between, some try over and over to fight and survive while others just let things happen to them.