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Overview
"Where are they taking me?"
"It's for your own good, Brit," Dad said.
I was shoved into a small, stuffy room, and the door was locked behind me. I waited for my dad to realize he'd made a terrible mistake and come get me.
But he didn't.
For sixteen-year-old Brit Hemphill, it's hard to know who she can trust. Convinced she's out of control, her father has sentenced her to Red Rock: a center for supposedly rebellious teens, where the therapy consists of name-calling and the girls who get privileges are the ones who rat out their peers.
But then Brit meets V, Bebe, Martha, and Cassie—four girls who keep her from going over the edge. Together, they'll hold on to their sanity and their sisterhood despite the bleak Red Rock reality.
Synopsis
"Where are they taking me?"
"It's for your own good, Brit," Dad said.
I was shoved into a small, stuffy room, and the door was locked behind me.
I waited for my dad to realize he'd made a terrible mistake and come get me.
But he didn't
FOR SIXTEEN-YEAR-OLD Brit Hemphill, it's hard to know who she can trust. Convinved she's out of control, her father has sentenced her to Red Rock: a center for supposedly rebellious teens, where the therapy consists of name-calling and the girls who get privileges are the ones who rat out their peers.
But then Brit meets V, Bebe, Martha, and Cassie four girls who keep her from going over the edge. Together, they'll hold on to their sanity and their sisterhood despite the bleak Red Rock reality.
VOYA
Sixteen-year-old Brit Hemphill's mother disappeared six years earlier after slowly going crazy, a reality with which Brit must deal. Brit lives with her father and stepmother and plays guitar in a band until her dad drops her off at Red Rock, a school for unmanageable girls that intimidates the attendees and rewards them for telling on each other. Group therapy consists of forming a circle around a girl and screaming insults at her. Treated like a prisoner, Brit earns privileges by working her way through levels imposed by the instructors. She feels isolated until she becomes friends with a group of girls who dub themselves "Sisters in Sanity." The girls meet secretly late at night to plot shutting down the entire institution. As they devise a plan that will work, each must face her biggest fear. The chapters are short and the plot gripping. Although the situation seems unreal, the book is based on the author's research and interviews with girls who attended behavior modification camps like the fictional Red Rock. Reading the book is like gazing at an accident and being glad not to be the one there. Readers can understand why parents might believe these camps are a good idea, but they can also see that they cause more damage than help. Some of the action is heavy-handed, with a clear message, but readers will care enough about the characters to want to know what happens to them. Reviewer: Cindy Faughnan
Editorials
Children's Literature -
Sixteen-year-old Brit Hemphill has magenta streaks in her hair, calls her stepmother the "Stepmonster," has decorated herself with tattoos, and plays guitar in a punk rock band. Okay, so this rebel is not every parent's dream child, but she is hardly a sociopath. Her father sees things differently, however, and so on Labor Day weekend before Brit's junior year in high school, he drives her to a "boarding school" called Red Rock Academy in the middle of nowhere, Utah, and leaves her there, as he says, "for your own good." Red Rock is a boot-camp-style treatment center that specializes in taking the rebel out of rebellious girls. Its approach is to demean and demonize its charges. Unqualified counselors belittle, confront, and inflict punishments as part of a strategy of breaking the girls down. It is harsh, non-therapeutic, and downright harmful. Little by little, Brit finds V, Bebe, Martha, and Cassie, four other "inmates" who help each other cope, and, as things at Red Rock go from bad to worse, the girls figure out a way to expose the facility for the bogus, dangerous institution it is and uncover some of their own hidden truths in the process. As an author's note acknowledges, the fictional Red Rock is rather more oppressive than actual behavioral modification boot camps that she has investigated, but the place, characters, and story are well-drawn and believable. This suspenseful novel is full of heart. Reviewer: Debbie LevyVOYA
Sixteen-year-old Brit Hemphill's mother disappeared six years earlier after slowly going crazy, a reality with which Brit must deal. Brit lives with her father and stepmother and plays guitar in a band until her dad drops her off at Red Rock, a school for unmanageable girls that intimidates the attendees and rewards them for telling on each other. Group therapy consists of forming a circle around a girl and screaming insults at her. Treated like a prisoner, Brit earns privileges by working her way through levels imposed by the instructors. She feels isolated until she becomes friends with a group of girls who dub themselves "Sisters in Sanity." The girls meet secretly late at night to plot shutting down the entire institution. As they devise a plan that will work, each must face her biggest fear. The chapters are short and the plot gripping. Although the situation seems unreal, the book is based on the author's research and interviews with girls who attended behavior modification camps like the fictional Red Rock. Reading the book is like gazing at an accident and being glad not to be the one there. Readers can understand why parents might believe these camps are a good idea, but they can also see that they cause more damage than help. Some of the action is heavy-handed, with a clear message, but readers will care enough about the characters to want to know what happens to them. Reviewer: Cindy FaughnanSchool Library Journal
Gr 7 Up
Already unhappy at being forced to go on a family vacation and missing the chance to play with her punk band at a music festival, 16-year-old Brit is horrified when her father drops her off at Red Rock Academy, a "boot camp" in Utah. Dragged away from him by muscular guards, a sobbing Brit passes an unhappy night before being strip-searched and presented to a therapist the next morning. She is diagnosed as having oppositional defiance disorder and is introduced to the Red Rock reward levels: Level 1-you remain indoors in isolation, emerging only for individual therapy or to use the bathroom; Level 2-you get your shoes back, can leave your room for meals and group therapy, and can receive mail from family members; and so on. In this prison-camp atmosphere, Brit eventually makes four supportive friends with whom she is able to expose the bogus treatment being administered by Red Rock's unqualified staff, one of whom has a record of abusive behavior. Along the way, she escapes for a night and begins a romance with an older bandmate. Although Forman does a good job of capturing teen friendship and angst, the book is not strong on character development. For example, though Brit believes that her stepmother wants her out of the way, readers never gain a true understanding of the father's motivation for committing his daughter, an omission that may be frightening for teens.
—Ginny GustinCopyright 2006 Reed Business Information.