Becoming Chloe by Catherine Ryan Hyde

Summary/Cover Image from Publisher's Website:

Meet Jordy. He’s on his own in New York City. Nobody to depend on; nobody depending on him. And it’s been working fine.
Until this girl comes along. She’s 18 and blond and pretty–her world should be perfect. But she’s seen things no one should ever see in their whole life–the kind of things that break a person. She doesn’t seem broken, though. She seems . . . innocent. Like she doesn’t know a whole lot. Only sometimes she does.

The one thing she knows for sure is that the world is an ugly place. Now her life may depend on Jordy proving her wrong. So they hit the road to discover the truth–and there’s no going back from what they find out.

This deeply felt, redemptive novel reveals both the dark corners and hidden joys of life’s journey–and the remarkable resilience of the human soul.

Review:

Becoming Chloe is one of those books that gives you hope in the world we live in, that even if it fells like the world is crashing down around us sometimes and we're nothing short of loosing it all, there is still beauty in it. Beauty that is endless. Beauty that gives you hope no matter what the situation.

From the first page, the reader is thrown into the world of Jordy, a boy who's just about lost it all. He's homeless and has no money to speak, as well as a big cut in his head that he doesn't want to talk about. But that doesn't stop him from reaching out to Chloe, a girl who is so worse of then him, it makes him look privileged. But inside the beautiful, bubbly, and sometimes simple Chloe hides secrets so dark, it's slowly making her loose it all. So Jordan starts operation beautiful world with a mission to show Chloe that the world is beautiful even with the chaos, wars, and murders surrounding them. And off they go on a trip across the country were they'll meet the nice and mean and see the beautiful and ugly. But will Chloe be able to pull it all together by the end? Will Jordan? You'll just have to see.

Jordy and Chloe were both main characters I loved from the beginning. Jordy was always the put together one, the adult in the relationship, but yet he had just as much freight and horror in his love Chloe had, leaving me to never cease to root for him no matter what the situation. Chloe, on the other hand, was in most cases the child, so emotionally detached from the world it made you wonder if there was something mentally wrong with her, but at other times she's wise beyond her short eighteen years of life. She also was a character I rooted for from the first and last page and everything in between.

The plot of this moved smoothly and never once made me loose interest. Though, the one thing I loved most about it was its ability to give hope to the reader no matter what the situation and make you grateful for the live you have because there's always someone out there worse of than you and beauty still out there to be amazed by. It was just such a great and empowering message!

In all, Becoming Chloe is my first book by Catherine Ryan Hyde but it definitely will not be my last. My last words consist of this; Read this book! It's touching, empowering, gritty, and hopeful! A book I feel most should read at least once in their lifetimes.

Grade: A-
 
Becoming Chloe is now out!

Source: Author. Thanks, Catherine!