Thousand Words
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- $17.99
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- $17.99
Publisher Description
Ashleigh's boyfriend, Kaleb, is about to leave for college, and Ashleigh is worried that he'll forget about her while he's away. So at a legendary end-of-summer pool party, Ashleigh's friends suggest she text him a picture of herself -- sans swimsuit -- to take with him. Before she can talk herself out of it, Ashleigh strides off to the bathroom, snaps a photo in the full-length mirror, and hits "send."
But when Kaleb and Ashleigh go through a bad breakup, Kaleb takes revenge by forwarding the text to his baseball team. Soon the photo has gone viral, attracting the attention of the school board, the local police, and the media. As her friends and family try to distance themselves from the scandal, Ashleigh feels completely alone -- until she meets Mack while serving her court-ordered community service. Not only does Mack offer a fresh chance at friendship, but he's the one person in town who received the text of Ashleigh's photo -- and didn't look.
Acclaimed author Jennifer Brown brings readers a gripping novel about honesty and betrayal, redemption and friendship, attraction and integrity, as Ashleigh finds that while a picture may be worth a thousand words . . . it doesn't always tell the whole story.
PUBLISHERS WEEKLY
When Ashleigh texts a naked picture of herself to her college-bound boyfriend, Kaleb, at an end-of-summer party before her junior year, she has no idea what she has unleashed. After an ugly breakup, Kaleb passes the picture around, and it immediately goes viral. Ashleigh is rapidly ridiculed, vilified, suspended, arrested, and sentenced to community service for distributing child pornography. Her father's job as superintendent hangs in the balance, and her relationship with both parents is in tatters. Chapters move between Ashleigh's present time in community service, where she creates anti-sexting PSAs and makes a much-needed ally, and the photo scandal as it unfolds in the past, heightening and prolonging the horror as more and more people see the photo, and Ashleigh is relentlessly mocked and harassed. Brown (Bitter End) brings her characteristic raw honesty to this wrenching story, examining the explosive fallout and repercussions of a spontaneous decision without moralizing. Ashleigh's struggle to accept responsibility and cope with the ways she has been laid bare before her peers is sensitive and genuine. Ages 15 up.
