Tell Me a Secret Review

Tell Me a Secret by Holly Cupala

Publisher: HarperCollins

Release date: June 22, 2010

Source: Publisher

Tell me a secret, and I'll tell you one…

In the five years since her bad-girl sister Xanda’s death, Miranda Mathison has wondered about the secret her sister took to the grave, and what really happened the night she died. Now, just as Miranda is on the cusp of her dreams—a best friend to unlock her sister’s world, a ticket to art school, and a boyfriend to fly her away from it all—Miranda has a secret all her own.

Then two lines on a pregnancy test confirm her worst fears. Stripped of her former life, Miranda must make a choice with tremendous consequences and finally face her sister’s demons and her own.

Review:

Going in to Tell Me a Secret I had no idea what to expect, novels about teen pregnancy can go one of two ways. Over dramatized and dull or emotional and intense. Tell Me a Secret was definitely the latter. Miranda was a shy and confused character, and she was dealing with so much. After losing her sister, Miranda starts to wonder what really happened to her, what was the secret her sister mentioned, but never revealed? As the novel progresses, Miranda's life really changes. She abandons her old best friend and befriends bad girl Delaney and she has no relationship with her demanding mother and reclusive father. Things couldn't get any worse right?

When Miranda finds out she's pregnant things start to really spin out of control. Miranda reacts to the news a lot better than I would and stays strong even when left friendless and alone. One of my favorite parts of the novel is the online pregnancy chat forum she joins. Here she befriends a lot of other women who are experiencing what she is, but she doesn't even tell them the truth about her age and situation. Even though I couldn't relate to Miranda, I still really, really felt for her. She had no one to turn to when she really needed someone.

A huge part of the novel revolved around Xanda, before and after her death. When Miranda meets up with Xanda's ex-boyfriend she begins to learn some suspicious things about Xanda and her death. At times I wanted Miranda to stop thinking about Xanda and be her own person. The best thing the pregnancy did for Miranda was show her how to be herself. She stood up for what she believed in and loved the little being inside of her with all her heart.

There was a lot of emotions throughout this novel and I had a hard time putting it down. Holly Cupala is a fantastic writer and she drew me into this story and didn't let me go until the last page. By the end, Miranda has faced a variety of trials and triumphs and a lot of the characters have changed. This was an overall intense and amazing debut and I cannot wait to read Cupala's sophomore novel (2011).

Overall: 4.5 out of 5 stars