Very intriguing, can't help but want to know more.

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Jack is a poor kid who finds himself in a tough predicament. The book opens with his life going from bad to worse. He arrives home from school and his mom isn't in the rocking chair where he expected to find her. They live in harsh poverty. It sounds like she's addicted to opioids and has lost the struggle to care for her kids. Heartbreakingly, he finds her hung by a belt from the ceiling fan in the bedroom. Jack has to cut down his own mother's dead body and conceal what happened from his younger brother Matty, who is just arriving home from school himself. Jack quickly makes up his mind on how he will handle the situation - he's going to wait until Matty is asleep, then drag out the body and quietly bury it. He tells Matty that mom has gone on a trip. They were already on the verge of an intervention from Child Protective Services when mom was still alive. They now have $15 to their name, a half a sack of potatoes and few canned goods. Jack is ready to step up and figure out a way to take care of himself and his brother.

The opening of this book is quite raw and emotional. The descriptive writing of the horrible things Jack has to do feels all too real, The circumstances of the kids are bleak and I felt very frightened for their future. Interspersed with the story line of what Jack discovers and does, are brief excerpts of another narrator. They're very intriguing, it's hard to tell who is narrating, but they mention Jack. By the end of the first look, it seems the those excerpts are from a girl at school, a girl that Jack stands up for to a bully, a girl that seems very vulnerable and mysterious. She's reflecting back in her memory of spending just a brief time with Jack, knowing him just 9 days. It seems to be setting up the book to move forward with a split timeline before and after they 9 days they knew each other. It's an interesting hook that effectively draws in the reader and makes me want to know more.