New Review! Counting Flowers by Beth Andrews 4.5 Cranky Stars

Counting Flowers by Beth Andrews
My rating: 4 of 5 stars

4.5 Cranky Stars


We all have quirks. Things we like done a certain way or things that get us through our day and help us cope. Some of us have anxiety so bad it’s a daily struggle to make it through the day and it makes everyday things like driving hard to do. I know someone who is deathly afraid to get behind the wheel and has never done it a day in her 80 years on earth. I personally get anxious going to crowded places alone and love things in even numbers. This isn’t about me but it’s about Natalie Hewitt and counting the flowers on her wall (not like the song) and trying to maintain her perfect façade until it all comes crashing down.


Natalie is the perfect student, daughter, best friend and girlfriend or so she wants everyone to believe. She begins each day with counting the tulips on her wall before she can even get out of the bed and plaster on her pageant worthy smile, but it doesn’t stop there she has to check everything three times before even leaving the house or leaving her car. It starts to slowly consume her life and that will eventually cause her to break right? Her best friend Astrid is slowly pulling away and Astrid’s twin which is Natalie’s boyfriend Phillip thinks she’s seeing someone else that someone else is Owen Radlowski. She is grasping at all the strings in her life as they slowly unravel and make her realize it’s exhausting to pretend. Her plate is full with extra curricular activities on top of parents who don’t have the time to spend with her and her brother who is an addict but hiding it very well. When she decides to tutor Owen she doesn’t realize this will turn her carefully constructed perfect world upside down and make her question everything about herself.


I liked Natalie. She was harsh on herself and when the cracks started to show she spiraled. She just tried too hard. I was screaming at her to please relax and let go you are 17 have some fun. I wanted to like Phillip but he was too much for me. Maybe just a typical teenage boy which I haven’t’ dealt with in ages. He wanted to make rules but only for Natalie and at one point I wanted her to just punch him and walk away. Owen Radlowski (seriously you have to call him by his whole name) was an enigma and not much was said about him other than he was a grumpy hard-working high school hockey player who apparently hated to read The Catcher in the Rye. I think he shook Natalie’s world to the core, and she needed someone like him. Astrid meh I could do without her. She’s the one best friend that we once had who bailed at a moment’s notice and blamed their crappy attitude on you. This is book would be perfect for someone around Natalie’s age who needs to feel not alone with trying to be the perfect everything and is struggling with mental illness.


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