Lush by Natasha Friend

Lush
Natasha Friend
178
Rating: 9/10

“Lush” is a book about a teenage girl named Sam. Sam has to live with an alcoholic dad and a yoga obsessed mom. Not your normal family right? She doesn’t think so. As a thirteen year old girl it makes it even harder. Plus she has a younger brother to protect from getting hurt. Sam can't even admit to her friends that she has an alcoholic dad. Sam still needs to confess to someone about her life, so she goes to a stranger. Sam writes about all her worries concerning her father's alcoholism on scraps of paper and places the notes in between the pages of “A History of Modern Whaling” which is not the most popular novel. To her surprise, someone does respond to her desperate needs and throughout the book they are very good pen pals. One day, while Sam puts the note in between the pages of that book she is startled by a boy named Drew. She had no idea who Drew was but suddenly, he was attracted to her. Having distractions to get your mind off of your crazy life is fine, but when it involves drinking and partying you start to regret ever leaving in the first place.

I learned that this book can really help teens that are struggling with this issue of alcoholic parents. In the back of the book there are many hotlines of numbers you can call if you are thinking about running away or just information about the subject of drugs and alcohol. It also made me realize how lucky I am to have healthy loving parents. I can't even imagine having to deal with an alcoholic dad who thinks its good parenting to just say "good morning" and then never talk to your kid for the rest of the day, which Sam's dad did in this book.

The author really did do a great job writing this book and I recommend this book to anyone, even if you don't have alcoholic parents.