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A high school boy comes to terms with his drug addiction, life with an alcoholic father, and a younger brother who looks up to him.
The Horn Book
Trapped in a downward cycle of substance abuse and skipping class, Pip is forced to attend individual and group counseling sessions. In a predictable conclusion, the teenager comes to realize that although his father is an abusive alcoholic, Pip has the power to change his own life. Neither Pip's woebegone first-person voice nor his pop-psych insights help this tightly focused story rise above the level of dated problem novel. From HORN BOOK Spring 2004, Copyright © The Horn Book, used with permission.
Kirkus Reviews
Tackling a familiar theme, Murray pens a compelling debut about a teenage boy with an abusive, alcoholic father. Pip, who's usually stoned, goes into counseling to avoid getting expelled and thereby incurring even more of his father's wrath. In the high schooler's convincing first-person narrative, he struggles with his family's secrets but starts to fall apart under the pressure. A helpful counselor, the boys in his group counseling sessions, and a new teacher provide some support, but it's concern for his younger brother that gives Pip the courage to try, with mixed success, to give up drugs. Painfully believable scenes reveal his father's drinking and violence, his mother's addiction to Valium, and Pip's own escape from his miserable home life through marijuana and alcohol. No easy ending ensues, but Pip's emerging strength, realistically portrayed, bodes well for his future. (Fiction. 12+) Copyright ©Kirkus Reviews, used with permission.
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