The young adult literature is relatively new - it just kind of exploded in the 2000s. When I grew up, there weren't bookstores with sections dedicated to teen lit, nor was my generation raised reading books written specifically for us. Because of that, today we still think of books for teens as children's books and so when you write a book that includes sensitive topics, it just seems even more controversial. What's troubling to me about that is these are issues adults know that teens deal with. Not writing about them makes them something we don't, or can't talk about.

Every reader is different. There's no book that's inappropriate for every person, but there are people who cannot handle everything.

What the hell happened to Pluto?!

Hannah wasn't my first kiss, but the first kiss that mattered: the first kiss with someone who mattered. (pg 222).

I wanted people to trust me, despite anything they'd heard. And more than that, I wanted them to know me. Not the stuff they thought they knew about me. No, the real me. I wanted them to get past the rumors. To see beyond the relationships I once had, or maybe still had but that they didn't agree with.

Betrayal. It's one of the worst feelings.

You don't know what goes on in anyone's life but your own.