As a 15 year old, Meredith prepares herself for her father’s homecoming six years early. She can feel nothing more than anger that he is out after the heinous crime that was thrust upon her and many other children in the surrounding area by her sexually sadistic father. She wants to have a safe place where it will never happen again and she can feel safe. In this quest, she meets Andy, her paralyzed friend, and a few other friendly faces along the way. As she moves on with her life, she finds ways to take care of her father for good.
Meredith is the lovely young girl who shares the pain of her life with the reader. She is a 15 year-old girl struggling with teen issues as well as her father’s early release and her friend Andy’s strides to walk again. She has an almost unhealthy obsession with numbers and the meanings and how strong they are. She also has to be clean, and in a mission to disgust, her father she stops showering.

The reoccurring theme of conflict is Meredith combating with her mother about her dad coming back home. “So now we’re marked for life. His picture is even on the New Jersey Sex Offenders internet Registry”(Wiess 5). Then when her father returns, her battles turn to him. “I wake up Saturday with the dogged hope that my father has somehow died over night,…”(Wiess 53).

I loved this book and would suggest it for a young adult to adult audience, this book has some serious topics and harsh language, but it was a real page turner and kept my interest the entire time and I wanted to keep reading. The way she writs is so passionate; you feel like she is your friend going through this, and you are there watching it happen.