Deeper By Robin York

[amazon_link id=”0349404194″ target=”_blank” ][/amazon_link]’Deeper’ is Robin York’s Young Adult debut.

When Caroline Piasecki’s ex-boyfriend posts their sex pictures on the internet. It destroys her reputation as a nice college girl. Suddenly her once promising future doesn’t look so bright. Caroline tries to make the pictures disappear, hoping time will bury her shame. Then a guy she barely knows rises to her defence and punches her ex to the ground. West Leavitt is the last person Caroline needs in her life,. Everyone knows he is shady. Still they hang out, they talk, they listen. Though Caroline and West tell each other they’re just friends, their feelings intensify until it becomes impossible to pretend. The more complicated her relationship with West gets, the harder Caroline has to struggle to discover what she wants for herself and the easier it becomes to find the courage to fight against the people who would judge her.

I found ‘Deeper’ a bit of a difficult book that took me quite some time to get into, but when I eventually got past the unexpected difficulty, I found myself enthralled in the sordid world of online pictures, trust issues and unexpected love.

The story is seen through the perspectives of the main characters, Caroline and West, two troubled souls on campus.

Like I said I initially found this book a bit of struggle to get into, I think this was because I wasn’t all fond of Caroline, the lead character. I found her difficult to warm to her. Although I did feel sympathy towards her for the situation that she got caught in, a situation that seems to appearing to becoming a bit of distasteful trend, but as time went on and she grew stronger with the help of those around her, we saw a more fun and outgoing version of herself, as she gained confidence in herself and began to stood up to the people that insulted her.

It’s unfortunate that in this day and age, how easily things get out of control now that we have the internet, how private moments of intimacy can be shown to the world without a second thought. Caroline goes to university looking forward to a professional career but when photographs of herself suddenly appear on the internet taking part in a sexual act, her whole world falls down around her. One moment of abandonment and reckless sense of trust and she finds herself exposed to ridicule and abuse from her peers. While her ex is seen as the big boy, Caroline is called names and insulted. Her hero comes in the unlikely form of West, a broody boy from the wrong side of the tracks, who from first impression Caroline was told to stay away from but when West defends her honour one day, Caroline sees a friend in him and together they form a kinship, but even though the young couple are attracted to each other they always maintain that they are just friends, but that is just words and they can’t keep their hands off each other complicating their already complicated relationship even more.

As the hero of the story, West sets out to help Caroline, help her get past the upset and to see herself for who she is really is, a sweet girl who is caught at the wrong time and puts her trust into the wrong person, Caroline wants to also help West, knowing that his upbringing was far from ideal, she wants to be there for him.

Both people not only provide sexual accompaniment for each other, but a new companionship and a solace during dark times.

One issue that I had with the story was that sometimes the characters would say something and regularly found myself thinking was this an action or a thought and this confused me at times, occasionally making this book unnecessarily hard work.

This book is an interesting read that highlights the moral issues and consequences of revenge porn. With complex characters and illicit content that will make the reader blush, ‘Deeper’ is a book that was initially a slow burner for me but quickly heated up.

You can buy [amazon_link id=”0349404194″ target=”_blank” ]Deeper (Caroline and West)from Amazon[/amazon_link] and is available to buy from good bookshops.