Heroine

By: Mindy McGinnis

Narrated by: Brittany Pressley

A captivating and powerful exploration of the opioid crisis - the deadliest drug epidemic in American history - through the eyes of a college-bound softball star. Edgar Award-winning author Mindy McGinnis delivers a visceral and necessary novel about addiction, family, friendship, and hope.

When a car crash sidelines Mickey just before softball season, she has to find a way to hold on to her spot as the catcher for a team expected to make a historic tournament run. Behind the plate is the only place she’s ever felt comfortable, and the painkillers she’s been prescribed can help her get there.

The pills do more than take away pain; they make her feel good.

With a new circle of friends - fellow injured athletes, others with just time to kill - Mickey finds peaceful acceptance, and people with whom words come easily, even if it is just the pills loosening her tongue.

But as the pressure to be Mickey Catalan heightens, her need increases, and it becomes less about pain and more about want, something that could send her spiraling out of control.

©2019 Mindy McGinnis (P)2019 HarperCollins Publishers

AMAZE!

Mindy McGinnis never disappoints. Both the story and narrator are great! A very nuanced and graceful take on addiction and the opioid crises.

Breath Taking

Wow.... this book was unbelievably good. I think this should be mandatory reading in school. Brittany was absolutely the best auditor for this. So worth every penny you spend on this book.

Intense.

Emotional right from the first line. The research is spot-on, characters as well. Brittany, who's become one of my favorite narrators, knocks it out of the park, yet again. Glad the only pills I take are sinus or allergy ones.

Powerful

Mickey fractures her hip just a few months before senior year softball season. After one prescription of OxyContin, she’s hooked. Good thing she has it under control. She’s not an addict like Josie, the girl who gives her pills. She can stop any time she wants. Mickey just needs to be ready for spring training. She’d never crush and snort the pills. Until she does. She’d never mix them with water and shoot them into her veins. Until she does. She’d never switch to heroin. She can stop any time she wants.

HEROINE sent chills through my body from start to finish. I wanted to climb into my Kindle and stop Mickey from taking that first extra pill. I was the kid who listened to the Don’t Do Drugs lectures and took them seriously. I tell doctors I don’t want pain meds after surgery. I make the nurses remove the morphine drip the minute I’m lucid. I don’t fill pain med prescriptions. I’ve never had a substance abuse problem because Mickey is my nightmare. I’m lucky those lectures scared me so much, because I can see myself, in Mickey’s shoes, becoming her.

Mindy McGinnis has her pulse on the heart and mind of a teen who falls into addiction. She’s seventeen. Goal oriented. Softball. College scholarship. She knows her body better than the doctors the way most teenagers know more than adults. Nothing bad will happen because bad things happen to other people. Addiction happens to other people.

HEROINE should be required reading for teenagers, their teachers, coaches and parents. Anyone could become Mickey. Those of us who don’t have more fortunate DNA and get scared by cautionary tales. We are the lucky ones.

Great Story

A little slow at times but overall really well written. It is a very serious topic and can be really hard for people who have experienced drug use in real life.

Good. Just not my thing.

Read it for book club. It’s a good book club book. It’s be good for teenagers. I don’t identify with this story. And it’s too predictable. It’s not fresh.

Heroine

The title drew me in, and I wasn’t disappointed in the double meaning. The author took me on a trip that so many have experienced. The storyline helped me understand how easily drug abuse can happen.

Relatability

Insight and relatability hit home and helped me with my own understanding of how easy something can quickly get out of control.

Bittersweet ending

This book had a lot of shock factor. It was quite sad and depressing, the ending was very bittersweet, but fitting nonetheless. Seeing the characters interact really pulls at your heart strings.

Timely content, great read, and good audio!

I'm not sure I can say what I think wholly of this book without giving things away. While I can say that we know Mickey wakes up "all [her] friends are dead", we don't exactly know what happened. We don't know how or why or exactly what led them all there. There were moments I wanted to hug Mickey, moments I wanted to throttle her. Same with her friends from softball and her own parents. How could they not see? How could they let her continue down this path of destruction? While I can't say anything as to the facts or the way the drug use was depicted within the story, it *felt* real to me. I felt as if I were in Edith's house standing next to Mickey, Josie, Luther, and Derek. Yelling at them to be smarter, to not make these choices. It all seemed to fly by so quickly.

I'm glad it didn't end up tied neatly in a bow, a package delivered under a tree. I'm happy McGinnis stuck with keeping things more true to life. Her writing was stellar and I was sucked in from the beginning to the end. I love that she doesn't stick to one genre and I never know what I'm going to get from her. I'm sure at some point she'll circle back, but so far I'm loving it.

Brittany Pressley did a great job of taking on the role of Mickey throughout the book. I felt the emotion coming from her and the pacing was really well done. I also had no problems distinguishing who was speaking, even if the text didn't tell me; or when it was thoughts versus her talking out loud. I was thoroughly impressed with her as a narrator and she will definitely be one I'll look out for in the future, as I'm fairly picky with my narrators. :)