Monday, April 18, 2016

After the Woods~ Reviewed by Hailey Hinrichs

 





"I become very still, trying to make myself shapeless so he'll forget I'm a GIRL, because that feels the most dangerous of all."
     Julia and her best friend Liv beat the odds. When a man jumped on top of Liv, Julia did what any best friend would do. She tried to pull Donald Jessup off Liv and ended up taking Liv's place so Liv could get away. After she is found after two days of running from Donald, everyone she knows tries to make her believe that she should just forget about it. Julia begins to just bury it deep down and move on, like Liv begs her to do.
     Fast forward one year.
     Another girl's body is found in the same area Liv and Julia were attacked. When hearing about it, memories that Julia has tried to bury finally resurface.
     While Julia struggles trying to contain these awful memories, Liv starts hooking up with Shane Cuthbert and starving herself. Is it because she feels guilty for getting away from Donald Jessup while Julia took her place?
     When Julia finds out the truth about Liv, will they ever be able to get back to how they were?
     Will anything ever be the same after the woods?
     
      I really liked this book so I gave it 4 out of 5 stars. I felt so bad for Julia's character. Her therapists were crazy. They literally didn't do anything to help her. Her family and best friends tried to make her forget everything when obviously she should've tried talking about it. Bottling things just doesn't help. At some point, it'll all come out. I also in a way felt bad for Liv because her mother was extremely hard on her and I think if I had a mother like that, I'd be like her. Obviously since I haven't been in that situation I couldn't necessarily connect with Julia's character but I feel like I would've handled it like her. I would recommend this to any of my friends.


2 comments:

Anonymous said...


Hailey,

Did you like how Julia took Liv's place, or do you think that the author should have let Liv get captured?

Would you say that Liv seemed, in a sense, a little ungrateful to Julia for taking her place?

All in all, I thought your review was really well written and I enjoyed reading it.

Anonymous said...

Sarah,

I definitely liked that Julia took Liv's place because it's something any best friend should do.
Liv seemed ungrateful that Julia took her place but as you read the story, you find that it's really not that. Liv has so much guilt from what happened that she tries to just block it out and not talk about it.