Dead Ends – Erin Lange

“I had a foot on some guy’s throat and a hand in my pocket the first time I saw Billy D. He was standing across the street, staring – not even trying to be sly about it – just staring without a word, without even blinking.

The two boys are so different and you are not meant to like Dane, he is a bully and a thug and its only his grades that have stopped him from being packed off to the alternative school where most of the kids in his neighbourhood have ended up, on the days they go to school. Billy has just moved and he wants to stop moving, unless his father is at the next place him and his mum move to. Dane doesn’t know his dad and claims he doesn’t want to but Billy D assumes he does and puts pressure on him to look.The story is heartbreaking as you find out more about the two boys and their background but Dane’s doesn’t sound so bad compared to Billy’s, not all the time anyway.  Dane and Billy’s friendship is what stands in the foreground of this book but there is so much hidden in the background, Billy helps Dane find out who he truly is, that he can be a friend and not a bully and that punching someone is not always the answer to your problems. 

The other side characters were incredible and I loved that the story showed other friendships too, like the boys’ mothers and them finding Seely. I loved what developed between Seely and Dane and what kind of effect that had on the story. Dane’s mum in particular came across as such an incredible character because of how much she cared for her son and how much she powered on through regardless. I liked that she had her faults and I liked that she was herself no matter what, I really hope that big ticket it still framed after the end of the story! 

The story will stick with me for a long, long time and I really think it will most people. the situations the boys find themselves in, the problems they face and the things they learn from their experiences make for such a beautiful story. It had me racing through my emotions faster than any other, going from happy to sad to angry and back again in a mere few sentences. Sometimes I could be laughing and hurting at the same time reading it, but that just goes to show how incredible a story it is!