Ferocity Summer by Alissa Grosso

“Would you rather be dead and know it, or alive and not know it?”
Scilla Davis is haunted by a horrible accident that she was involved in last summer—a drunken, reckless joyride that ended in tragedy. With a big trial looming, life seems empty, unreal, and utterly hopeless. It’s especially painful watching her best friend, Willow, slowly destroy herself with pills and booze. Yet Scilla can’t seem to wrest Willow—or herself—from a path of self-destruction.
But there might be a possible escape from this nightmare. As a dangerous new drug called Ferocity sweeps the nation, an FBI agent asks Scilla to turn narc and help locate the Ferocity kingpin. In exchange, she could avoid conviction for her role in the accident. All she has to do is deceive and betray people she’s known all her life . . .

Goodreads Summary


Scilla is the perfect protagonist for this book as she is so easy to relate to.  Teens likely will have either experienced first-hand or heard of events like the ones that happened to Scilla in the novel.  She can be hard-headed and ridiculous as a character at times, but overall she is representative of the typical female teen.  She is faced with several hard choices in this book, choices that include drinking and drugs.  The reader will be side by side with her in the story, it is told from her perspective (first person).  Perhaps because the book is written in first person or because Scilla is so easy to relate to that the reader will find it easy to connect to Scilla's character, even when Scilla makes it difficult to like her.

Scilla is a tad annoying in the story.  Her character is rude and aggressive towards others, at times, and she has a few confusing romantic feelings.  Her character can be gritty just like the storyline, but somehow it all works.  The other characters could be the readers' friends or people the reader knows.  They tie in quite well to the story. 

The plot itself was slightly unbelievable at times, but mostly retained a remarkable sense of realism.  This book is heavily driven by the plot, the reader will find that the book is fast-paced and hard to put down.  The Goodreads summary above does a terrific job of summing the book up without giving too much away.  Overall, this book is recommended to young adult/adult readers.

4 Stars

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