#jarrod shusterman

[haveyoureadthisbook-poll]

Have you read Roxy by Neal Shusterman and Jarrod Shusterman (2021)?

yes

no

I didn't finish it

I've never heard of it

Voting ended onJan 9

[ace-through-space]

Neal Shusterman, Jarrod Shusterman, Dry

[ungekvsst]

As a kid you idolize your parents. You think that they’re perfect, because they’re the yardstick by which you measure the rest of the world, and yourself. Then as a teenager they just piss you off, because you realize that not only are they not perfect, but they may be even a little more screwed up than you. But there’s that moment when you realize they’re not superheroes, or villains. They’re painfully, unforgivably human. But the question is, can you forgive them for being human anyway?

Excerpt from Dry by Neal and Jarrod Shusterman

[nealshustermanreal]

@sofiandjarrod have placed a GLEANINGS in a little library! Can you find it?

Follow them on Instagram and TikTok for more fun giveaways!!

[pithia]

His life doesn't flash before his eyes. More like a random box of old photos tossed up into the wind. Brief twisting glances of moments carried off, forgotten the instant they're remembered.

from Roxy by Neal Shusterman and Jarrod Shusterman

[gatorsnot]

tw: drug mention

Okay, I don't usually make posts like this, but whether if you or someone you love has struggled addiction or not, PLEASE look into this book. Possible triggering content (drug abuse, withdrawal, overdose, and death) and some inaccuracies aside, I haven't yet read a book that got such a raw reaction from me.

I don't think I've ever NEEDED a book before, but this one has shaken me to my core. As someone who grew up with an opioid-addicted parent and is currently taking prescription painkillers legitimately and as CAREFULLY as possible out of said trauma, this was...profound for me. I finished it all in a day and cried twice. I definitely wasn't ready to have such a visceral reaction.

If you can't get your hands on a physical copy of the book, it's available for Kindle and has a fully casted audiobook on Audible. Please, please, PLEASE check this out if you get the opportunity, I seriously think this book could save lives.

[alexsfictionaddiction]

Review: Roxy by Neal and Jarrod Shusterman

Neal Shusterman’s Arc of a Scythe series is very popular within the book blogging/BookTube world and it’s a series that I’ve been interested in for a while. Despite owning the first two books, I’ve not had a chance to pick them up yet (story of my life!) but I was very excited to read his newest release, co-authored with his son Jarrod.

When the sensual yet fatal Roxy places a bet with her overachieving friend Addison to see who can bring someone to ‘The Party’ first, siblings Isaac and Ivy Ramey are in their dangerous and deadly firing line. Of course, the bright lights and the sweet relief of the drugs are incredibly attractive to unassuming minds and the Rameys are both on a fast track to the trouble that lies beyond the grip of their new best friends.

I can honestly say that I have never read from the point of view of drugs themselves before. Roxy is Oxycontin, a powerful opiod prescribed as a painkiller to Isaac after a football injury. Watching her slow takeover of his mind as he develops a dependency on her (through her ‘eyes’) was so disturbing but an incredibly unique perspective. I imagined Roxy to be a beautiful, dark seductress, who completely bewitched the helpless, mere mortal, teenage Isaac. I can imagine that developing an addiction is exactly like getting into an intense, toxic relationship that you don’t realise is bad for you until it’s way too late.

Watching the drugs interact with each other at ‘The Party’, which I can only assume is some kind of invisible venue that is not on our plain, where they all congregate. Al (alcohol) is always there because he gets everywhere. Molly (MDMA), Mary Jane (marijuana), the Coke brothers Charlie and Dusty (cocaine) and Crys (crystal meth) are all regular fixtures at The Party. I was blown away by the detail of this strange yet somehow plausible world that the Shustermans built for these drugs to inhabit. 

Ivy has unmedicated ADHD, which causes her to run into trouble at school. To get through her final year, she takes Addison (Adderall) to up her focus and energy levels in order to get her work done. She is terrible at picking friends and boyfriends and I think this is due to a plethora of emotional issues that she hasn’t ever dealt with. When Addison starts making her life a whole lot better, I think she started to see him as the lifeline that she had been waiting for and it’s easy to see why. Her relationship with Isaac is a really lovely, realistic one and it’s very obvious that there is so much love between the siblings.

There are little interludes throughout the book where we hear from other drugs. I loved getting to know them all as ethereal, unreliable characters and I definitely learned a lot about how they behave. I can only imagine the fun that the Shustermans must have had while writing these. They’re so well researched and the amount of imagination that they must have taken is mind-blowing.

I think Phineas (morphine) was the drug that haunted me the most. Hearing him talk about his different uses and how he feels about them gave me such an overwhelming feeling of dread. Of course, Phineas is often administered when people are on the brink of death or in extreme pain. He never sees the bright side of human life and as a result, I couldn’t picture him as anything other than an empty, dark void, floating around these people’s systems.

Roxy is a very thought-provoking, unforgettable book. I was completely torn apart by the ending and I finished it knowing that I would probably never read another book like it. With themes such as addiction, mental health and suicide, it’s definitely best to proceed with trepidation if you are likely to be triggered by any of these topics. It is haunting, cautionary and truly fascinating with voices that literally burrow into your system and refuse to leave.

[2021ya]

ROXY

by Neal Shusterman & Jarrod Shusterman

(Simon & Schuster BFYR, 11/9/21)

9781534451254

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From the team that brought you the New York Times bestselling Dry comes a riveting new thriller that explores the opioid crisis.​ The freeway is coming. It will cut the neighborhood in two. Construction has already started, pushing toward this corridor of condemned houses and cracked concrete with the momentum of the inevitable. Yet there you are, in the fifth house on the left, fighting for your life. Ramey, I. The victim of the bet between two manufactured gods, Roxy and Addison—Roxicodone and Adderall, the low-level cronies of more illustrious bosses, who more than anything else want to prove their own lethality. The wager—a contest to see who can induce overdose first—is a race to the bottom of a party that has raged since the beginning of time. And you are only human, seduced by the release they bring. Tempted by the control they offer. They are beautiful, and they will give you the world—as long as you promise them forever. But there are two I. Rameys—Isaac, a soccer player thrown into Roxy’s orbit by a bad fall and a bad doctor and Ivy, his older sister, whose increasing frustration with her untreated ADHD leads her to renew her acquaintance with Addy. Which one are you?