The Prison Doctor by Dr Amanda Brown

Amanda Brown was a regular loved GP in her area until a change at the practice led her to a job in a youth prison for boys aged 15-18 firstly which taught her a lot.

From diabetic patients, severe suicide attempts, young men who grew up in care and feeling lonely without a mother's love and also winning round the prison governor too Amanda has had to prove her worth as a doctor which is obvious she did her job extremely well and was a genuinely caring and interested person in all their lives, making them mostly feel at ease and show their more human side of emotions not a hard prison face all the time.

Amanda describes her life working most recently in a women's prison too where a lot of her patients have been subject to abuse, rape, violence at home etc feeling safer in prison though some have become addicted to drugs making it harder for them to get control of their lives completely. In a really open look into life working in many prisons it gave us an exclusive look into what working in that environment must be like.

Many thanks to the publishers for allowing me to review this book for them!

The Words That Fly Between Us by Sarah Carroll

Living with her investor stressed dad and her mum, Lucy doesn't like to be around her dad when he's in a mood and he is often, causing verbal and emotional pain on his wife and daughter.

Her best friend Megan also gets put downs from her so called friend Hazel whom makes sly comments and digs at Megan's body and about her growing blog too. Despite Lucy's efforts she can't stop her best friend being effected by Hazel...

However as an aspiring artist despite what her dad says, Lucy has a generous heart and soon gets to know the mysterious artist next door after leaving her a gift anonymously and being left a gift back in return.

The main theme in this novel is about speaking out about abuse and it's never right to have to put up with especially at home. We see how the family changes due to stress about money from her dad. We also see how it's important to follow your heart and never giving up on passions and dreams. It was a really great novel in the way we can imagine being in Lucy's shoes and having to face so many issues alone.

Many thanks to the publishers for allowing me to review this book for them!

Nothing Tastes As Good by Claire Hennessey

Julia is a girl affected by her past, Annabel is the voice urging her on into disordered eating, a voice of a girl who died due to her anorexia.

In order to get a message home from beyond the grave, Annabel must help Julia to become happy believing Julia is stressed and sad because of her pressure she puts on herself to be perfect, flawless in her future career as a journalist and run the school newspaper efficiently.

However as deeper issues surrounding an older man come to light, broken friendships, new friendships and even a relationship bloom and soon Julia is destroying but living her life at the same time during her rocky patch inspired by Annabel's memory.

This was a strange read personifing yet making anorexia a ghost at the same time. Julia was a believable character to suffer as you see her become engrossed in discovering Annabel and her desire to be perfect on the newspaper team.  It was realistic but could be triggering at places too. I feel the writing flitted from amateurish to just uninteresting in areas but I finished the story and that was good overall.

All The Bright Places by Jennifer Niven

Finch meets Violet on a ledge, about to commit suicide they have to then meet with the school counselor after they both save each other. Yet the school rumour mill says she saved him more.

Charlie is Finch's best friend who has parents who are divorced and knows Finch well and all about trying to die before and having an abusive dad.

Violet was in an accident before and gets counseling by going to a mental health facility. She can't drive or cheer since the accident occurred as she lost her sister.
She and her sister Eleanor ran a website together in a fun magazine style while she still wears her sisters glasses since she died as she can't fully move on.

Finch and violet work on a project together and talk on Facebook where he nicknames her ultraviolet as a fun quirk.

Two broken people create a love and deep bond from misery and circumstance and while their parents banned them from seeing each other, they sneak around still to the point of throwing rocks on windows to sneak out.

But then he disappears and tragedy has struck possibly again...

This book was quite hard going in places as some parts of the story followed better than others to me and at times I did want to stop reading. Over all the storyline was great but could have been more on track with it in my honest opinion.

The Sun Is Also A Star by Nicola Yoon

Natasha is a girl living illegally in America and facing deportation back to her home of Jamaica due to her dad getting a DUI.

Daniel is a Korean guy living in America with his family where his brother has come back from studying to become a doctor and thus is quite an unpleasant character around Daniel as they fight a lot.

As Natasha goes to meet the only lawyer she thinks can help her case to stay in America she meets Daniel and didn't expect find herself liking him as much as she does. Though Natasha faces leaving America, she can't break it to Daniel and so it makes her feel guilty later when he finally understands but can their possible love and future stay alive in hope or never get going at all?

I wanted to love the book after all the hype but honestly for mW it fell very flat. I would have liked to know the main two characters deeper and have their stories more developed before they fall in like/love as they felt bland to me. As for the deportation and parent hope for child storylines they are great and really happen to many people so matter immensely.