“Beautiful” by Amy Reed is this crazy and twisted story of the life of seventh grader Cassie. Now you may be thinking What’s so special about this girl in seventh grade, isn’t she kind of young to be doing much? But you’d be surprised, and maybe even a little appalled.

Cassie just moved into this little suburb of Seattle, and this new school that is absolutely nothing like her last one. The kids that were considered cool in her old school would now be thought of as the complete and utter opposite. In this new setting, Cassie wants to work on her image and try to fit in with the popular kids. These kids are the druggies and “bad” ones. They care about nothing and no one.

On her first day Cassie is basically chosen to sit with these rebels simply because of her looks. All these older boys think she’s just beautiful and she, of course, jumps on any opportunity to act like she belongs somewhere since Cassie doesn’t exactly have a perfect family life. Cassie quickly befriends rebel Alex, who shows her the ropes on how to handle the druggie group, and what it is to truly not care about anybody but one’s self.

Pretty hard to believe that this is all happening to a girl in seventh grade.

Cassie is now on all sorts of drugs and drifting farther apart from her already broken family. Her housewife mother tries to keep everything in order but has no idea what her daughter has been up to. Cassie’s father, who’s always working, doesn’t seem to even love his wife at all, and hardly communicates with his daughter.

Falling into this downward spiral, Cassie seems to lose control of her life. Nobody is helping her, nor is she asking for it. To Cassie, this is what life is. It is drugs, and sex, and a hopeless day by day schedule.

The question being asked now is will Cassie improve herself and breakaway from this reckless lifestyle? Will she get the wake-up call that she so desperately needs? Or will she just dismiss all her problems as she has been doing and continue her daily routine until she runs into death?