Someone To Kiss My Scars

Rating 4.5 stars

Someone to kiss my scars is about two teenagers called Hunter and Jazz.

Hunter can’t remember anything about his life more than two years ago. His mother and brother have apparently died in an accident, hunter himself is covered in scars and has been told this was a biking accident also.

He starts having disturbing visions, and soon discovers these visions are actually other people’s memories. His best friend Jazz vows to help him resolve this.

Jazz is just fantastic, my heart went out to her and what she has to go through with her alcoholic mother. The book is compulsively readable, there are new questions that present themselves in every chapter gripping you into the story.
This author has some imagination I thought the ideas behind the book were amazingly written.

I would recommend this book however please read the content warnings as it is not for faint of heart, it’s marketed as upper YA but I’m an adult and found some of the content quite disturbing particularly with me being a mother myself.

I wasn't sure if I'd like this, but I'm glad I gave it a try. It's certainly not an easy read but it's written with huge amounts of compassion and empathy. Hunter and Jazz, the two leads, are just lovely: kind and strong despite everything the world has tried to do to them. And alongside the unflinching look at the dark side of human nature, there are some interesting ideas about memory and healing from trauma. Worth reading, but not for the faint-hearted.

TRIGGER WARNING: sexual abuse, self-mutilation, rape, pedophilia, incest, murder, violence, child pornography, suicide, homophobia, alcohol drinking. There might be others too, so please BE AWARE when you go into this book because it is VERY DARK!

PROS:
• Raising awareness about child sexual abuse. I think this is a very important book to read, mostly during our days! Brooke Skipstone is an amazing brave author because she took this extremely hard subject and put it into a book. Some might hate or disapprove her because she chose to touch some hidden scars of our society, but I think most of us will see what she tried and managed to do with this book.
• The female lead character wasn't a breathtaking painfully beautiful girl with a slim perfect body. This thing made me so happy because we need more representation for curvy girls/women! This world might be full of slim, wasp shaped women, but also, curvy ones exist and they are beautiful and very worth loving too!
• Writing style. I have no idea if this is a debut novel or not, but I have enjoyed the writing style! It really made me feel like I was part of the book, for the most time, thing that it is rare to very rare for me.
• Shoved me in a roller coaster of my emotions. This book made me cry, smile, feel rage and anger, hate, pain, pure ravishing desire to fight and save those children.

CONS:
• Some points, mostly the ending, felt rushed. The sex scene between Jazz and Hunter, for example. I mean, they both were victims of sexual abuse, and just like that, after a couple of days and mostly after Hunter remembered what had happened to him, he was prepared to have sex with Jazz?! I don't deny their emotional connection, but really, after all that, it made no sense and was very hard for me to believe that Hunter, with all those fresh memories, was ready for it!
• The fact that Jazz was speaking for Hunter, without even really asking him first if he agrees or not. She almost always asked him if he can take more AFTER she was saying yes on behalf of him. This thing really pissed me off! As I have said in one of my updates, I understood her pain and her desire to save others too, but in those moments where she was doing this, it made me felt that she didn't really care about Hunter's pain, like she was seeing him as an object to help her reach her goal.

OVERALL THOUGHTS:
• I feel the need to repeat it, even now, that this is a very dark novel! Will hit you very hard and will show you the cruel and painful reality that often, most of us, choose not to see or acknowledge it because we choose to live in our fantasy worlds. These things happen! And happen more often than we ever think! THIS IS A WAKE-UP CALL!

This book took me by surprise in an eye opening way. It didn’t shy away from hard topics (no spoilers) and try to cover up what many teenagers are going through. I like that it was a mystery too, with small pieces of the puzzle getting added chapter by chapter. I will definitely recommend to my kids when they reach high school age because I think it’s vital we all should be exposed to how other are living.

This book was a quick read that I really enjoyed. I will be looking for more works by this author. I was drawn in by the title and cover and what I found inside was a great story.

This book brings awareness to sexual abuse in the most unique way. It will very likely make you uncomfortable. It SHOULD make you uncomfortable. If it doesn't, you may be just as awful as the villains in this story.

From the very beginning I was hooked. It was mysterious and I needed to unravel the mystery. It follows two best friends that have been through awful abuse. I think the only way to describe one aspect of this book is magic realism. I was so interested in finding out what exactly was going on. I finished it so quick. I don't really want to say what goes on bc it's a wild ride and I personally hate spoilers. Pick this one up! The only issue I can think of was that the end was a little awkward, but it didn't take away from the book for me.

I really appreciated the authors note at the beginning. She states that these stories shouldn't be covered up. That teens, (or anyone of any age really), shouldn't hide their abuse. Encouraging everyone to speak out, even if it seems like they shouldn't. Ignoring the fact that people get sexually abused every single day doesn't help anyone. Pretending it doesn't happen is another crime in itself. I loved the way she explained it. I didn't expect to stumble upon such a unique book, but i'm super happy I did.

I found this book very hard to read but totally worth it, it highlights some really important issues in such a real way and is fantastically written.

Wow! What a terribly amazing book, that will literally make you feel disgust and may trigger those sensitive to abuse issues. This was written so well I couldn’t put it down. This book sheds light on a subject that is hard to talk about, read this book.

i really enjoyed reading this book, the topics were handled well done and the characters felt like real people.

Someone To Kiss My Scars deals with various triggers, such as abuse, sexual trauma, and pedophilia, but it covers these issues in a way that is honest about what teenagers go through every day. It covers these issues because most books targeting teenagers aren't nearly as upfront as they need to be. I did appreciate the trigger warnings at the beginning of Someone to Kiss My Scars, because the warnings gave me time to prepare for what I was reading. I highly recommend reading it!

Well written, interesting, gripping, scary, sad...

Deals with self harm, rape, incest...

That book moved me!

Thank you to NetGalley and the publisher for allowing access to this book. This is my honest review. All opinions are my own.