Reviewed in "Read It 'Cause It's Teen Fic" By The RoundTable. "Whatever you do, don't crack. If you crack, you fail. " Cracking means you're breaking. You're falling apart. But sometimes, you have to fall apart in order to fall together. *********************************** Zeenath has secrets. Things she's trying to hide, things she's trying to run away from. But that's hard to do when everything around her reminds her of what she's lost. She's been running. Running from her past. Running in the park, concentrating on one foot in front of the other. It's how she silences her mind. But when she meets another group of teenagers in college, she learns everyone has their demons. No matter how much she tries to hide her own, someone always finds out. And the dark, probing eyes of the silent, dark-haired Damian aren't making things any easier for her... Will Zeenath learn to let others into her life again? Will she find friendship, and in the process, find herself? Told in a series of journal entries and letters, join Zeenath on a heartwarming story about friendship, love, and loss. Because you're never too old to learn to let go and smile. Because people change...but memories never do.

"When I tell you that he hates me, you'll probably assume it's because he's a jerk...but you'd be wrong. He's not a jerk. I am." --- Several years ago tragedy struck Emma's home, leaving her broken... like a cup with cracks spiraling and slithering around the edges. Slowly, bitterness crept in like tar, hardening between each fracture to resemble a deceitful wholeness. She became a monster, and targeted her venom on the sweetest person she could find: Trinity Nixon. Too bad the boy Emma longed for was Trinity's brother. Now, as Emma fights to win the heart of the boy who despises her, she's forced to hide her demons. She paints her fragile cup in pinks, yellows, and oranges - all the colors of the sun. She paints on a smile, and an unusual sense of humor, so that the world will view her as bright and cheerful, when in reality she's breaking. But she's completely unprepared for the acidic truth that melts away the tar, demolishing her shell, and awakening the Emma White buried deep inside. --- Book 1 in The Dismantled Pride series *Story was previously titled "Faking It"