Pushing the Limits Read-A-Long: Week One

This is an amazing event hosted by Candace Book Blog, Dazzling Reads, PageTurnersBlog, The Book Swarm and The Bewitched Bookworms. I really enjoyed Pushing the Limits and I cannot wait to participtate more. Here is my review.

Every week we get to discuss different parts of the book and there is an oppurtunity to win in a giveaway. Yay!

If you want to take part all you need is a copy of the book (it is out today in the USA) and a platform to post on. Sound good? Head on over to The Bewitched Bookworms blogs. Link above.

Here are my answers to this weeks questions.

1.The story starts out with Echo’s thoughts on how she wants to answer her therapist’s questions (snarky, caustically truthful) which are quickly juxtaposed to how she does (milquetoasty and banal). Who do you think she hides the truth for more, her parents or herself?

Bam first question. And it is a toughie. What no warm up guys? Ok. I think it is a mixture of both. It is obvious she is hiding the truth from her parents as she was outright lying to them. But I think she is hiding the truth from herself more. Discovering the truth means thinking about it and she doesn’t seem to want to do that. She seems to elude a confidence that she knows what is right and everyone else is wrong. She has closed herself off.

2.We see Mrs. Collins, the school therapist, interact with both Echo and Noah in the first few chapters. From those interactions, what do you think of her? Is she a prototypical caricature of state care? Or do you think she’s there to make an honest difference in the lives of those she’s there to help?

From those early interactions I thought she was there for genuine reasons. She wasn’t your typical therapist. She seemed to do things outside of the book, if only slightly; her choice of decorations in the room for example. In her meeting with Noah, who was not with guardians, she showed she cared and not just putting on an act.

3.Noah has two friends, Beth and Isaiah, who have his back no matter what--through thick and thin--and he has theirs. Consequently, his life is a little easier because he has two people who know about his situation. Echo only has one close friend, and Lila will barely speak to her in school.
Do you think Echo would have had an easier time coping and moving on if she had friends like Noah does?

Most definitely. Echo is not comfortable with who she currently is. Noah has accepted, somewhat, the person he has become and I think his friends helped. Echo’s friends weren’t encouraging her to move on but to revert back to who she was before, which was not going to happen after her traumatic past.

4 . Echo fixates on a colorful ribbon that sits on the school counselor's desk during their one-on-one sessions.
Do you think this is a case of "Oh, look at the pretty ribbon. Let me zone out while staring at it" , or could it have a deeper significance?

When something is mentioned in a book that seems to be insignificant, I always focus on and try to remember it. More often than not these things are not as insignificant as they first appear. I say it has a deeper significance.

5 .) Noah and the jacket... Already when Noah and Echo meet for the first time, Noah got angry when Echo forgot her Jacket (pg 34). Then on Echo’s Birthday party Noah gave Echo his jacket when he saw that she forgot hers (pg 54). There is a significance behind his anger when Echo has no coat and it tells already so much about Noah!


a) Why do you think is Noah so focused on Echo and her Jacket and what does that tell you about Noah's character?

It tells me Noah has a caring side. If he didn’t care about Echo catching cold he wouldn’t have bothered offering. It was that moment I noticed his character start to change.

b) Show us your favorite jacket! Either with you having it on or alone!

My leather jacket. This wasn’t cheap but it has lasted for many years and I love it.

6. Echo wears gloves all the time to hide her scars. Not only for her sake, but obviously also for the others. When Noah sees Echo’s scars for the first time he’s shocked.


a) Do you think this was the moment he began to see Echo in a different light?

For sure. That was the moment Noah realised that Echo hasn’t had a happy time in her past either. Many rumours had been going round about Echo but that was the moment Noah knew something serious had happened and she is not that different from him.

b) Show us your favorite pair of gloves!

I don’t like wearing gloves. I only wear them when it is snowing and they aren’t particularly nice looking. They are purely for practical reasons.

Becky