Review: Roxy

Title: Roxy

Author: Neal and Jarrod Shusterman

Release Date: November 9, 21

Rating: 4/5 Stars

Find it here: Goodreads

Synopsis from Goodreads: The freeway is coming.

It will cut the neighborhood in two. Construction has already started, pushing toward this corridor of condemned houses and cracked concrete with the momentum of the inevitable. Yet there you are, in the fifth house on the left, fighting for your life.

Ramey, I.

The victim of the bet between two manufactured gods: the seductive and lethal Roxy (Oxycontin), who is at the top of her game, and the smart, high-achieving Addison (Adderall), who is tired of being the helpful one, and longs for a more dangerous, less wholesome image. The wager—a contest to see who can bring their mark to “the Party” first—is a race to the bottom of a rave that has raged since the beginning of time. And you are only human, dazzled by the lights and music. Drawn by what the drugs offer—tempted to take that step past helpful to harmful…and the troubled places that lie beyond.

But there are two I. Rameys—Isaac, a soccer player thrown into Roxy’s orbit by a bad fall and a bad doctor and Ivy, his older sister, whose increasing frustration with her untreated ADHD leads her to renew her acquaintance with Addy.

My Review: I am super torn on this one. On one hand it is so well written and imagined and on the other it is extremely hard to read given that I have had multiple families deal with drug addiction. I didn't love the whole story line of the drugs having emotions but I can see where the authors were going with this one. The drugs "personalities" show us how the drugs work to suck the person in. The whole hierarchy of the drugs was a bit too weird for me though. I think this book could be very important for teenagers to read to show them how drug addiction can work. Overall it was a good, if weird, read.

*I voluntarily reviewed a complimentary copy of this book which I received from the publisher. All opinions are my own.*