Author: Faith Gardner
Publication Date: January 19, 2021
Book Description
A story that begins where too many others end, Girl on the Line is an essential #ownvoices tale of love, loss, and hope for fans of All the Bright Places and Girl in Pieces.
Life’s tough when you didn’t expect to be living it.
But now that Journey has a future, she apparently also has to figure out what that future’s supposed to look like.
Some days the pain feels as fresh as that day. The one with the pills, the hospital, and the end that didn’t come. Her parents don’t know how to speak to her. Her best friend cracks all the wrong jokes. Her bipolar II disorder feels like it swallows her completely.
But other days—they feel like revelations. Like meeting the beautiful Etta, a community college student who is a world unto herself. Or walking into the office of the volunteer hotline and discovering a community as simultaneously strong and broken as she is.
Or uncovering the light within herself that she didn’t know existed.
Perfect for fans of Challenger Deep and Mosquitoland, Faith Gardner’s stunningly written and unflinchingly authentic #ownvoices novel unspools in heart-wrenching detail and shows how Journey finds a way to see another day.
Book Review
Girl on the Line is an impactful story about a depressed high schooler struggling with her mental health.
After Journey attempts suicide she has to learn how to be happy again. Journey is struggling with her mental health diagnosis. I really enjoyed being in Journey’s head. It wasn’t always a happy place to be, but it was interesting to see how she felt and why she reacted to certain things. Journey tries to leave everything from her old life behind which is hard on her best friend. Her boyfriend broke up with her and she is dealing with still wanting to be with him but also dealing with their lost friendship. Journey volunteers on a crisis hotline where she helps others. She does a great job and makes new friends with the other volunteers. She makes a mistake that goes against the hotline rules which causes her to feel like she is losing everything. Journey doesn’t think about how her choices affect others but is always trying to help people in need. Journey meets a new love interest which allows her to embrace her sexuality. She has a difficult family situation but great friends. She needs to learn how to let people in. Journey is a great character and I really enjoyed reading about her working through her struggles to become happy. Journey seemed so relatable. She made a lot of mistakes and felt guilty whenever she realized how her mistakes affected others. I recommend Girl on the Line for fans of books focused on teenagers struggling with their mental health.
Thank you Harper Teen and Edelweiss for Girl on the Line.
About the Author
Faith Gardner is the author of The Second Life of Ava Rivers and Perdita. Her short fiction has appeared in dozens of online and print publications. When she’s not writing, she works as the publisher at the Daily Kos and plays in the band Plot 66. She lives in the East Bay area and can be found online at http://www.faithgardner.com.
Just Reading Jess 
Great review, thanks for sharing your thoughts
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Thank you so much!
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