Speak by Laurie Halse Anderson

From her first moment at Merryweather High, Melinda Sordino knows she’s an outcast. She busted an end-of-summer party by calling the cops—a major infraction in high school society—so her old friends won’t talk to her and people she doesn’t know glare at her. She retreats into her head, where the lies and hypocrisies of high school stand in stark relief to her own silence, making her all the more mute. But it’s not so comfortable in her head, either—there’s something banging around in there that she doesn’t want to think about. Try as she might to avoid it, it won’t go away, until there is a painful confrontation. Once that happens, she can’t be silent—she must speak the truth.
One word: GORGEOUS! I can’t believe I have never read this before! Of course I knew the story, who doesn’t? But I wasn’t expecting Speak to well speak to me as much as it did. The heroine Melinda Sordino is a believable, bitter, teenage outcast who represents a little piece of everyone. This novel illustrates the importance of speaking up without sounding preachy, but with Anderson’s flowing, yet gritty writing, the message is received with cheers and tears. It is no wonder that Speak has become an instant classic and been turned into an equally moving movie with a wonderful performance by Kristen Stewart as Melinda. My advice: Read it and then See it. You will not be disappointed.