Stealing Parker

by Miranda Kenneally

[Rowena]

One of my hot buttons is the teacher/student relationship in books. I’m just flat out, not a fan of it. Actually, I should clarify that I’m not a fan of a minor student and teacher relationship. Professors and college students I’m not really against but I wouldn’t go out of my way to read those books unless they come highly recommended but with minors (and 17 is still a minor in my opinion), I don’t like it.

So with that said, I wondered how I would like this book because it’s got one of those relationships in it. Now, I’m a fan of the author because I absolutely adored Catching Jordan so despite my reservations going into this book, I had to read it because I enjoyed the last book by Kenneally that much.

The verdict is in: I liked it.

I liked the book in general but the part of the book that deals with the coach/student relationship, I wasn’t a fan of that. But that wasn’t what made this book. Or the entire book anyway so I was happy about that. The book focuses on the main character, Parker who’s mother came out of the closet and left the family with her lesbian lover. Parker, who grew up as a strict Christian has been shunned by her best friend, her friends and a lot of families at Church. Rumors fly around her school about how she’s going to follow in her mother’s footsteps and how she’s a slut as well. All rumors start with her ex-best friend Laura. Try as she might to ignore it all, Parker is very affected by the rumors, by her mother’s betrayal (which is how she sees it) and everything else going on in her life. Her father stubbornly insists that the family go to the same Church that turned their backs on them and that frustrates Parker to no end because a place that is supposed to be forgiving is anything but and really, the people at this Church pissed me the heck off.

Parker is trying to keep things going in her family now that her mother left. She cooks, she cleans and she runs things at home while her brother turns to drugs and alcohol to make it all go away and her father works and drowns himself in the Church which isn’t good for anyone. Parker turns to kissing boys and what I want to know is when did kissing boys make you a slut? That is the dumbest thing I’ve ever heard.

But what I really enjoyed about this book was the friendship that blossomed between Will and Parker. I thought Will (Corndog) was such a cutie patootie but when the crap hits the fan with Parker and Coach Hoffman, the way that both Will and Drew turned on her made me so angry on her behalf. They should have had more faith in her because they were supposed to be her friends. She already had bad luck with shitty friends and for the two guys that I liked the most in this book to do what they did, gutted me because I was good and pissed at both of them. Nobody is perfect and Parker wasn’t any exception but she was a good person at heart and it really sucked that not one person outside of her family knew this. Everyone should have known that because to know her and Drew and Will knew her was to see how awesome she really was and so I hated that she had to deal with so much stupidity from the people at school and the people at Church….and then the people in her circle of friends.

Watching Parker deal with everything thrown at her made my heart hurt because she didn’t deserve all of that. Coach Hoffman, as cute and hunky as he was, made me want to puke. He was an adult that acted like a straight up douchebag and I couldn’t like him to save my life. Did I see what Parker saw in him? Totally. Did it justify what Brian let happen between them? Hell no. He was a no good, piece of shit that needed to get punched in his freaking face for taking advantage of Parker the way that he did. He had no flipping excuse for carrying on with her the way that he did and each trip to the laundry mat made me want to find him and punch his face in. He stopped being hot the minute he took advantage of Parker and he took advantage of her. Whether she was willing or not, he was the adult and the teacher, he should have put a stop to it and if they weren’t caught, he probably would have kept right on meeting her late at night across the street and doing what they were doing. Ugh.

After everything was said and done, I admired the heck out of Parker. She blossomed into such a strong person by the end of the book and I was really happy that things worked out for her but I wanted to see Will grovel more, I wanted Drew to suffer more for not having more faith in Faith and really, I wanted Drew to apologize to Parker for not trusting her. For not having her back when she needed him to have her back, especially since she was going to walk away from the one guy that she actually wanted a relationship with…FOR HIM. But still, Kenneally can write the heck out of a story so despite all of the things that made me mad in this book, I enjoyed the book and I cannot wait for more from this author.

She does good stuff, Miranda Kenneally does. I’m a total fan.