You should be able to manoeuvre a bathroom by now.

Life was miserable for Cossette Hugo. Her older brother, Victor, had come back a hero from Iraq when she was just 13, only to be killed by a motorist texting on his mobile phone not long after. Cossette had loved and admired her brother and missed him terribly. Her parents had split up then, his father leaving to marry a blond bimbo named Tawny, taking the house, the money and pretty much everything else apart from her, forcing his mother to work double shifts at the hospital to simply pay the bills of both of them. But it meant she didn't see her mum much. To make everything even worse, now over two years later, a gorgeous looking girl named Hilda Dyson, was making life at school unbearable with her bullying attacks which terrified Cossette and left her bruised and in trouble with the Principal.

Cossette's only constant pleasure was the company of her Christian friend, Matty, and her kind and generous family, and running through the streets at night: a possibly dangerous occupation now, given the serial rapist killer who has been operating in the town. She wished she were dead but suicide is weak and cowardly and also selfish: she couldn't do that to her mother. Then suddenly things became even worse for her. And she developes a crazy plan.

My Beautiful Suicide is an unusual book which begins as a fairly normal story with one teenage schoolgirl with such a lot going for her but unable to see past her daily terrors, to something else entirely. Well written, it makes for compulsive reading as Cossette's life spirals out of control in her quest for the perfect suicide whilst, at the same time, actually provides her with reasons to stay alive. The main protagonists, and Cossette and her school lunch time friend, the athletic Chris, are quite well drawn and the book becomes a mix of incipient romance, Christian advice from ever patient and loyal Matty, terrors and disgust of a personal kind, a murder mystery (not hard to see the resolution of the who-dun-it?) anger problems and alienation, and very frequent baths. The story line is compelling, keeping the reader's interest alive, like Cossette herself, throughout.

The book is greatly enhanced by the performance of Michelle Sparks, who slightly breathy and youthful voice is the perfect foil for Cassette, who is relating her story in the first person. Ms.Sparks reads with emotion, good intonation and expression and even also gives seperate, if only slightly different, voices to the other protagonists. Even the longer than expected pauses between chapters encourages a tension. Hers is a performance which really carries the story forward.

An easy read if not always comfortable, it is not a book for young people despite the protagonists ages, given the content covered. But recommended for more adult readers who enjoy reading about the darker aspects of the mind and of the world itself.

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