Just Listen by Sarah Dessen

Just Listen by Sarah Dessen
Published by Viking Juvenile; April 6, 2006
Paperback, 371 pages
Borrowed from library

Annabel Greene is the girl who has everything. At least, that's what she portrays in her modelling shoots. But Annabel's life is far from perfect. Her friendship with Sophie ended bitterly, and her older sister's eating disorder is weighing down the entire family. Isolated and ostracized at school and at home, Annabel retreats into silent acceptance  Then she meets Owen - intense, music-obsessed, and determined to always tell the truth. And with his guidance, Annabel learns to just listen to herself and gains the courage to speak honestly. But will she be able to tell everyone what really happened the night she and Sophie stopped being friends?

- Description from Goodreads.com

This is the first book for the first month of the Sarah Dessen Challenge hosted by I Eat Words and what a great way to start it! I feel like I need a list to organize my thoughts so here are the:

The Things I Liked

- The way Sarah merges flashbacks with the narration so seamlessly. It really helped me understand the main character, Annabel and the story being told.

- Whitney's eating disorder. An eating disorder is something many teens go through and so I was very happy to see it taken seriously. And yet, although it was taken seriously, it wasn't hard to relate to what Whitney was going through or what Annabel was feeling while Whitney was in treatment. 

- The Will Cash situation. Realistic. 

- The friendship with Sophie. Realistic. 

- I liked Owen, or rather Annabel's relationship with Owen. It didn't move fast at all which made it feel very natural, not like "He's the only guy that I'm close to so I'm going to hook up with him".

- The cute Anger Management terms Owen shared with Annabel and technically, us. It made me feel like I was part of this huge inside joke.

There really isn't much I didn't like. I kept on trying to be more critical and ended up with some valid dislikes. Afterwards, though, I felt that was a bit nit-picky and so I didn't include them. After all, if I didn't recognize them during reading, surely they're not important?

Highly recommended. You will cry.