This novel is stressful, people! I stayed awake all night to read it because I couldn't sleep until I knew how it ended. Luckily, it's a novel-in-verse, so you can finish it in a few hours. It's about a 17-year-old who is attempting to save his brother from death row. It feels so realistic that every plot twist almost gave me a heart attack. The author does an excellent job of showing messy family relationships. Love is complicated. It can't be turned on and off like a light switch. If your brother commits murder, you're probably not going to stop loving him in an instant. Relationships are messier than that. The characters in this book have to work through some complex issues.

I'm not sure if I fully "get" novels-in-verse. In this book, the poetry format doesn't always enhance the story. Most of the poems could have been written as paragraphs and had the exact same impact. So, in my opinion, this book isn't poetry; it's prose formatted to look like poetry. It makes me wonder why the author chose verse. If the poetry format doesn't change anything, why is it necessary? Or, maybe I just don't understand poetry and need to stop overthinking. Bottom line: This is a very good story. Read it, if you don't mind having a thousand mini heart attacks.