My Beating Teenage Heart by C.K. Kelley Martin

Hello classmates! Today I will be talking to you about the book My Beating Teenage Heart by C.K. Kelley Martin. This book is about a boy, Breckon Cody and a girl Ashlyn Baptiste. It is from both points of views. Ashlyn doesn’t know what happened to herself or what her story is all that she can do is watch Breckon struggle with his problems. Breckon just had his sister die and he thinks that is his fault and is talking it really hard. Ashlyn doesn’t know why but she can hear the pain in Breckon’s breath and how he is struggling and no one else knows. As his life spirals downward she promises to herself that she won’t let him hurt himself anymore than he all ready is. This book really draws you in to want to see what Ashlyn will do to happen and to see if Breckon can make it. This is my absolute quote from the beginning because the author uses such great descriptive words, “And then, just as my mind begins to expand with questions
-who am I?
-where is this?
-how am I...

I’m falling, plummeting through the glittering darkness at a speed that would normally make your stomach drop. Instinct kicks in and makes me throw out my hands to break my fall. Only, I don’t have any- no hands and no stomach either.

The fear of falling exists in my consciousness and nowhere else. There’s nothing I can do to stop my descent. Beneath me continents of lights beam their brightness as I speed towards them.

Catch me, stars. Help me.”

Amazon agrees with me too. They named this the book of the month in October of 2011. Here’s what they had to say about it, Ashlyn Baptise doesn’t know where she is. Now somehow without a body she still exists in consciousness, and she finds herself drawn to a stranger. Brecken Cody is out of sorts, too. Having recently lost his sister, for which he feels partly to blame, Brecken is in the throes of grief. It is hard to talk about this novel without giving away a pivotal plot point but that the way in which Martin reveals how Brecken and Ashlyn are intertwined was unexpected—and amazing. Voice really drives the novel, making it impossible not to root for both characters as they try to navigate new emotional (and in Ashlyn’s case, physical, too) experiences. In the vein Gayle Forman’s If I Stay and Jenny Downham’s Before I Die, My Beating Teenage Heart is the type of novel that will remain with you long after you’ve read the last page. --Jessica Schein

The recommended reading age is 14 plus. This author has not won any awards, but I am confident she will in the future. She has also written four other books; The Lighter Side of Life and Death, One Lonely Degree, Yesterday, and I Know It’s Over. You will have to read to find out what happens to Ashlyn and Breckon! This book reminds me of the book Where She Went by Gayle Forman because of the very dramatic plot line.

Recommended by Meg Stecklein