Junk by Melvin Burgess

This book feels very real to me compared to other books because it shows how quickly life can change. Junk, or Smack in the US, is about two teenagers who learn the harsh realities of life the hard way.  Tar has an abusive father and desperately wants to escape the cage his life has created for him because of this. Gemma, Tar's friend, loves to rebel against her parents and so decides to join Tar when he decides to run away. They leave to go to Bristol and soon Tar makes friends with Richard who introduces him to some squatters who let the two teens live with them. Tar is a gentle character and so makes friends easier but Gemma comes across as extremely naive and so is disliked by the squatters. This leads to split loyalties for Tar, his new friends or his old ones? While staying in Bristol they begin to take drugs on a regular basis and soon realise they can't remember a life without them.

I really enjoyed reading this book although I wouldn't recommend it if you want something light hearted. Whenever something happened to any of the characters I felt as though it had happened to a friend of mine because, as I said at the start, they feel so real. Burgess really built up the characters and their relationships before anything happened to them, which meant she something did happen it truly did sadden me. It gave me a real insight into people's lives and how drugs can affect them, which is hard to but make it a teen novel. I wouldn't recommend this for anyone below the age of 14 purely because of some of the themes in the book but I think it is something everyone should read at some point.