This is What I Did by Ann Dee Ellis

Have you ever done or seen something you thought was so horrible, that you would never be able to escape it? This is exactly what happens to Logan in This is What I Did.

"A year ago I was fine. That's when there was nothing wrong.

A year ago, in seventh grade, I was fine."

Logan was a normal kid, with a normal best friend, and a normal family, in a normal school until one day he sees something that he wasn't supposed to, involving his best friend, Zyler. After this everything changes. His family moves away so he can have a new start at a new school, but somehow his secret past slips out and the bullying starts all over again. Zyler's gone now, so Logan feels as if he has no one except, Laurel, another outcast at his school who shares her love of palindromes with him. Logan's parents don't know how else to help him they've tried therapy and Boy Scouts but nothing seems to work for Logan. Everything only seems to get worse.

Ann Dee Ellis uses a literary style that we' ve seen before in Laurie Halse Anderson's Speak, but she adds her own unique twist with the use of little illustrations, like a picture of a Lamborghini, Logan and Zyler's favorite car, these give the reader clues of Logan's interests and thoughts. This style makes the book a quick easy read that you'll want to finish in one sitting, not only to find out Logan's shameful secret, but also because Ellis has developed her characters so richly you'll empathize with them even if you've never gone through something similar to Logan's situation.

This is What I Did would be a great book for fifth graders and up. This is the age when a bad situation like Logan's feels like the end of the world. This book could help teachers and kids who have to deal with child abuse, bullys, and victims everyday look at their situations from a different perspective.

All in all, This is What I Did, was a great book. Even though the topics were serious, Ellis made the book light and compelling all the way to the end where she plays a little joke on the reader. No kid should feel bad about having to read this book. If anything the lightness of the book made me feel as if what happened to Logan wasn't as bad as it actually was.