Title: Speechless
Author: Hannah HarringtonEdition: paperbackSeries: noneReleased Date: August 28th, 2012Publisher: Harlequin Teen
Everyone knows that Chelsea Knot can't keep a secret
Until now. Because the last secret she shared turned her into a social outcast—and nearly got someone killed.
Now Chelsea has taken a vow of silence—to learn to keep her mouth shut, and to stop hurting anyone else. And if she thinks keeping secrets is hard, not speaking up when she's ignored, ridiculed and even attacked is worse.
But there's strength in silence, and in the new friends who are, shockingly, coming her way—people she never noticed before; a boy she might even fall for. If only her new friends can forgive what she's done. If only she can forgive herself.Chelsea Knot made a mistake one night of a party, and one that got someone extremely hurt. After walking in on a boy at her school with another boy, she blabbed her mouth to her friends. This ended up with the boy from her school, Noah, wound up in the hospital. Once a popular girl, Chelsea's friends turn their back on her and in return Chelsea takes a vow of silence. She refuses to speak to anyone, and only communicates through a dry erase board and facial expressions. This way, she makes friends of Sam and Asha, two people she would never imagine becoming friends with. With their help, she finally makes things right and realizes what it means to be a good friend and not gossip.
Honestly, I wasn't expecting much out of this novel. I didn't know anything about it, other than that Hannah Harrington wrote it and she seems awesome on Twitter. Oh, and that the cover was very plain. For the longest time I thought it was just a mock cover because they were waiting to release the official cover. I was a little reluctant to read it because of that, but I decided to give it a try. Thank god I did!
Chelsea Knot proves that girls do have a sense of power. That's the one message I got from experiencing this novel through her point of view. In the beginning she's just a normal girl, and one that has troubles keeping a secret. So what? Every girl has that issue at some point. Honestly, give her a break! She wasn't in her right mind and made a mistake. But then she does the unthinkable and takes a vow of silence. WOOO. GO CHELSEA! I'm not saying that because I don't want her to spread more secrets or anything. I'm saying that in the sense of: "YOU GO GIRL. SHOW THEM WHAT YOU GOT." I would never be able to take a vow of silence like that, but Chelsea does it to prove a point and SHE DID IT! I really could see the development of Chelsea over the course of the novel and that made her one of my favorite characters!
I like that Chelsea was able to make friends without talking to them. Especially Asha. She's the weird freshman that works at the diner. They meet in detention one day and instantly click. In her art class, Chelsea gets paired up with Sam, a cute boy who she's never had much interaction with and was the best friend of the boy she spread the secrets about. The romance between Chelsea and Sam sparks and their relationship is really cute. I think Sam is a good guy, and if he went to my school I would definitely go out of my way to be friends with him!
Speechless rocked my socks off, but it didn't have an overall WOW factor. It didn't bring out that many amazing emotions in me, even though I connected with the characters very well. I kind of wish this was a series, just because I loved the characters... I guess that means I'll just have to pick up Hannah Harrington's other novels! 
