Through intense, diarylike chapters chronicling Charlie's journey, the author captures the brutal and heartbreaking way 'girls who write their pain on their bodies' scar and mar themselves, either succumbing or surviving. Feeling rejected, Charlie, an artist, is drawn into a destructive new relationship with her sexy older co-worker, a 'semifamous' local musician who's obviously a junkie alcoholic. But things don't go as planned in the Arizona desert, because sweet Mikey just wants to be friends. After spending time in treatment with other young women like her-who cut, burn, poke, and otherwise hurt themselves-Charlie is released and takes a bus from the Twin Cities to Tucson to be closer to Mikey, a boy she 'like-likes' but who had pined for Ellis instead. Seventeen-year-old Charlie Davis, a white girl living on the margins, thinks she has little reason to live: her father drowned himself her bereft and abusive mother kicked her out her best friend, Ellis, is nearly brain dead after cutting too deeply and she's gone through unspeakable experiences living on the street. Unmissable.Īfter surviving a suicide attempt, a fragile teen isn't sure she can endure without cutting herself. Mutual respect among the characters, crucially combined with Daniels' respect for them, ensures that none serve as mere props for our protagonist, and readers will hope they each get their own book in the coming series.Ī thoroughly enjoyable, emotionally rich, action-packed story with the most exciting new superheroes in decades. There are men both disappointing and noble, but the women and girls-white trans girl Danny, Latina crime fighter Calamity, technician/scientist Doc Impossible (racially cued only with a long black braid), and cyborg supervillain Utopia-drive the story and the action. Daniels has captured the alternating bursts of confidence and vulnerability often present in 15-year-olds with mentally abusive fathers and unsupportive mothers she threads it through a superhero story with a beautifully paced plot that has no problematic snags to interrupt the flow. But when the supervillain that killed her predecessor shows her intentions to bring destruction on humanity, Danny has to make decisions she thought she'd have more time to work out. She's taken to meet Dreadnought's colleagues (some welcoming, some not) in the Legion Pacifica and gets some answers to burning questions.

Guilt and elation jostle for prime position in her head as she deals with getting her dream body and massive power she can't yet control.

The powers transform her body, so her girlhood-once a total secret-is now visually impossible to hide. Danny's having a moment to herself when superfamous superhero Dreadnought drops out of the sky and dies in her arms-but not before passing her his powers.

Nemesis april daniels