Young Adult Book Reading Challenges discussion

Many books use flashback sequences to propel the story or to give background to characters. What did you think of the use of flashback sequences in Cracked Up to Be?

Do you think it enhanced or detracted from the story?

The flashbacks WERE the story. How could we have known what Parker was thinking without the flashbacks. Of course, we could have had conversations between the characters remembering the party but Parker was the only witness to the pivotal event. Or, more precisely, the fact that Parker was the only witness to what happened to Jessica was the pivotal event that drove everything that Parker did after the party.

I find it hard to imagine how the truth of Parker's experience could have been revealed to us - flashbacks seemed a suitable and necessary device.

Grace wrote: "The flashbacks WERE the story. How could we have known what Parker was thinking without the flashbacks. Of course, we could have had conversations between the characters remembering the party but P..."

Totally agreed. It's been quite a while since I read the book, but if I remember correctly, the flashbacks became longer and longer as the story developed, instead of picking up where the last flashback ended. I've read several stories with flashbacks, but very few that repeated the parts of the flashback we'd already read. It was like Parker was allowing herself more of the story each time.
I am not sure whether I liked the repetition or not. A part of me wanted to skip it.

I love the flashbacks. Sometimes while I am reading a book I find flashbacks to be used poorly. They give us not enough flashback or too many flashbacks. I thought this story did flashbacks perfectly. It kept me wanting more... they kept me curious and not annoyed, I felt like the flashbacks were perfectly timed as well.

I'll admit I skipped some of the repeated flashbacks too. But I think the repeats were put in there to let us know where we were in the flashbacks time period and also to re-read the whole event made the flashbacks even more intense. The flashbacks were my favorite part of the story. Right now after finishing the book I would love to read a story based of what happened during the time period of the flashbacks! That's how interesting they were to me.