Laurie Halse Anderson is an author known for her books about heavy hitting subjects. I haven't read any of her books but I had high expectations based on the reactions I've seen by everyone else. 
 The main thing I expected was to be hit with a lot feeling. That never happened for me. I mean, I certainly felt intense pity for the situation Hayley and her father, Andy, were going through. I wanted them to find happiness in their lives and sustain it. But I didn't feel the emotions deep in my bones. The book scratched the surface at most for me. I mostly felt frustrated that everyone's lives were shit and bad things kept perpetuating bad things. It made me sad but not as sad as I expected, or as weird as it sounds, hoped. I wanted to be feeling big emotions throughout this story. 
 That doesn't mean I don't think it was a good book. I think subjects like PTSD need to be talked about more because mental health has horrible stigmas against it that need to be broken down. And the only way that is possible is by talking and writing about it and having discussions. Anderson did a nice job of showing the different sides of someone's personality suffering from this and how it caused ripple effects in the people around them. 
 I also really liked the relationship between Hayley and Finn. Hayley was definitely not a favourite character of mine but the way her and Finn helped each other and made each other better made me happy. Especially when they both have some serious unfortunate circumstances in their lives. 
 Overall, this was a book I liked but disappointed me a bit based on the expectations I had for it. However, it's definitely prompted me to want to check out Anderson's other works.