SPOILER FREE REVIEW: HEROINE BY MINDY MCGINNIS

Title: HEROINE

Author: Mindy McGinnis

Pub. Date: March 12th 2019

Genre: YA Contemporary

Format: eGalley

Publisher: Katherine Tegen Books

Pages: 419 Pages

🖤ARC provided by author in exchange for an honest review🖤

GOODREADS | BARNES & NOBLES | AMAZON

Mickey Catalan is a star player for the High School Softball team and on the fast track to making history. Her prospects for college softball are looking promising but that all changes as a result of a car crash that brings her dreams to a halt. Given Oxycodone for painkillers & a lengthy period of recovery from her life threatening injuries, Mickey is left feeling desperate for a quick fix. Her encounter with someone who offers her more of the drug that is quickly sinking its teeth into her is only the start of a downward spiral. We see Mickey distance herself from her loved ones, making friends with others who like her have developed a co-dependent relationship with the drug. It starts with pain killers & escalates to other drugs, ultimately taking Mickey and leaving her a different version of the girl before the accident.

Whenever I pick up a Mindy McGinnis book its safe to say I know what I’m signing up for. I’ve come to deeply appreciate this author for taking on such tough real themes and handling them so well. There is no shying away from the dark & ugly truths here, instead we get a raw accurate portrayal of what it’s like to fall into addiction. Whether we’ve experienced it first hand or not, we’ve all known someone or had a close loved one experience this battle. Here we see a young teen who has a promising future & loved ones she finds herself lying to in order to continue to feed her addiction. While reading this book I felt despair & a sense of loss of control that I’m sure only scratches the surface. Every time I thought she was close to being exposed & wasn’t I worried for Mickey because I knew it only drove her further to push the limits. The book almost feels as its written in the stages of addiction one experiences. Denial was a tough one because the desperation comes through as well as the lying, stealing, and cover ups. The only reason I didn’t 5 star it was simply because although the addiction itself was deeply fleshed out, Mickey could’ve used more depth. Besides knowledge of her place in the softball team, we don’t get much on her life prior to the accident which didn’t allow for me to connect with her character. Despite this however, I feel this book absolutely carries importance & most of all hope.

Content Warning: Detailed drug addiction, overdose, withdrawals, death, car accidents, separation, infertility