Samantha McAllister looks just like the rest of the popular girls in her junior class. But hidden beneath the straightened hair and expertly applied makeup is a secret that her friends would never understand: Sam has Purely-Obsessional OCD and is consumed by a stream of dark thoughts and worries that she can't turn off.
Second-guessing every move, thought, and word makes daily life a struggle, and it doesn't help that her lifelong friends will turn toxic at the first sign of a wrong outfit, wrong lunch, or wrong crush. Yet Sam knows she'd be truly crazy to leave the protection of the most popular girls in school. So when Sam meets Caroline, she has to keep her new friend with a refreshing sense of humour and no style a secret, right up there with Sam's weekly visits to her psychiatrist.
Caroline introduces Sam to Poet's Corner, a hidden room and a tight-knit group of misfits who have been ignored by the school at large. Sam is drawn to them immediately, especially a guitar-playing guy with a talent for verse, and starts to discover a whole new side of herself. Slowly, she begins to feel more "normal" than she ever has as part of the popular crowd . . . until she finds a new reason to question her sanity and all she holds dear.
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[I shouldn't be reading the notes]***
(Disney-Hyperion, 6 June 2017, first published 16 June 2015, paperback, 400 pages, Around The Year In 52 Books 2019, 2 books related to the same topic, genre or theme #2, OCD, bought from @AmazonUK)
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I was in tears by the time I finished reading this book. It touched me in a way a book hasn't for a long time. Sam's OCD is very different than the OCD in the memoir I read. In this book, Sam's OCD is obsessive thoughts which, at times, are easy to hide. Sam is a great character. The book is narrated by her. Her voice is great and I loved her story. She's a complex person. I really felt for her. The author does a great job of bringing the horror and highs of high school to life. I didn't like Sam's friends, the Crazy Eights at first but I warmed to them. Sam is getting on really well and things seem to be good for her. The thing Sam discovers that make her further question her sanity is the moment this book almost snapped me in two. I didn't see it coming. I should have because plenty of hints are dropped but I was oblivious.
