Eye Contact by Heron Djenne Canvasback

Four teams of sixteen underprivileged troubled teenagers get an opportunity to start-over. Their backgrounds range from juvenile detention homes, foster care, orphanages, toxic parents, relative guardians, alternative school, homelessness, and gang life. They compete to receive a full pardon, their records expunge, before they turn eighteen. Only one team will win; only four teens will legally redeem themselves.

In a beautiful Caribbean rehabilitation center, they will learn to break their bad habits, or continue their adolescent self-destructive crimes into adulthood. The reform school/boot camp/ detention home is in a fictional Atlantic Ocean U.S.A. territory, Costa Puerto; it is made up of a chain of both volcanic islands and also man-made islands.

It's not all rivalry. After all, they share a lot more in common than they initially see. They grew up poor. Some recently found out that they were misunderstood due to undiagnosed disabilities. What is nature, what is nurture, and what is social conditioning?

There is something deeper, and it's lovely, when we look beyond our own eyes, and peer into another person.

The Pinterest book mood board link: https://pin.it/2tOYSme

Completed: Please read the chapters in chronological order. What team are you? You choose the winner.

*Content warning: includes mature language for realistic portrayals*