8 hours 19 minutes | Harper Audio | Contemporary | 9/15/2020
CW (from publisher): mention of sexual abuse, rape, assault, child abuse, kidnapping and addiction to opioids
28-year-old superstar Korey Fields promised to make 17-year-old Enchanted Jones singing dreams come true. Instead he lures her into an abusive relationship she can’t escape from. Part contemporary novel and part literary thriller, Grown is a brilliantly modern addition to the canon of YA books about abusive relationships.
The book doesn’t reveal all its secrets and employs clever literally tricks that may even have the reader doubting Enchanted’s claims. This book deals with a lot of triggering themes but I appreciated how Jackson was able to tell the story without graphic depictions of the abuse. Enchanted never loses her humanity.
I only wish this book had been longer. Jackson introduces several plot threads later in the book that I think would have grounded the story more if there was more time to explore them. I had the same thought when I read Let Me Hear A Rhyme last year. I don’t know if she gets edited down or if that is just her style.
I did a majority of this on audio and I thought Joniece Abbott-Pratt was the perfect voice for Enchanted. Her narration has a bright youthful quality and I’m glad to see her getting more YA roles.
I’m a lifelong reader who started blogging about YA books in 2011 but now I read in just about every genre! I love YA coming of age stories, compelling memoirs and genre bending SFF. You can find me talking all things romance at Romance and Sensibility.