What
happened to Ellie? Her mother Maya and her father had done nothing wrong, but
nevertheless they find their teenage girl taking drugs and offering herself randomly
to the boys around her. At a certain point, the parents’ helplessness leads
them to take drastic measures: they send their daughter away to live with a
good friend. However, what was intended as a means to give them all room to
breathe again and to start anew, ends in even worse chaos.
Narrating
the story from two points of view at different times is certainly a good way to
increase the anticipation of what might come and to keep the audience reading on
to find out what happened to the girl. Yet, I would have liked some more
creativity. It is all too obvious what Ellie does and which big event changes
everything. Too many apparent hints take away a lot of suspense and when I
finally reached the relevant pages, I was rather disappointed since I had hoped
to be surprised and not just to see my expectations fulfilled. What I liked,
however, was the way the mother’s and daughter’s development was paralleled. Telling
both their stories and struggles and having them run into the abyss and
repeating each other’s mistakes had some interest. All in all, the idea was
quite good but I had expected more from the description.
