Review: the bullied becomes ultimate bully?
Rating: 3 out of 5
Date: 05 5, 2012
This is a story of a bullied child going "Columbine."  I have some reservation related to the outcome being based in premise set (bullying) .  Hallucinations are a hallmark of an altered mind.  Since there are no drugs /drug use indicated - the hallucinations are not caused by that.  These hallucinations lend credence to the fact that there is something wrong with this child in his brain /chemically.  He may have gone on with his life and ended in the same spot without bullying due to whatever was causing his hallucinations.  Since he has a past hx of head insult/injury (tumor) he could have lots going on driving him that could be the cause of his final actions.  Rather than the bullying being the cause.  Though his hx may have just set "the perfect storm " for anything to be catalyst to drive him where he ended.  In any case, the combination sets this child in motion and the results end up where they do.  The enlightenment of bullying is an applaudible approach.  Just weakened by the other factor added for affect.There are some glaring issues that are confusing or conflicting:"She ran her pearly whites through his hair."  Where I come from "pearly whites " are teeth...lending a really odd vision to go with this scene."The school was on "code red" - complete school AND classroom lockdown."  Yet kids are pouring out into the halls like "loosed mice.""A scar that would never fully heal."  (When mother ran her hands over bump and surgical scar.)  A scar is actually, literally, a healed wound.  If not, it is then a scab or wound...There are others, but enough said on that.Grammar and punctuation need be reviewed and corrected.There was a bit of herky -jerky jumping about in first several chapters that smoothed out later.The book and story were okay.  The characters were fairly well developed.  The writer has pacing down, though the story was predictibly obvious within a couple of chapters.  That said, the writer does have a nice "voice" and will probably write some really good books in the future.I would have rated one more star had the book been properly edited and if the premise were not weakened by the issue I cited that took away some of the depth of the potential from the bullying factor.  Coupled with the conflicts in story, I just could not give the fourth one.I might give another work by this author a try, but not before reading the sample chapters first.Christine