It depicts the story of a boy and his two siblings trying to survive vicious emotional and physical abuse by their mother, Nikki.

[1] It also received recognition as a 2007 Best Book for Young Adults from the American Library Association.

[2] The book starts out with an introduction when Matthew Walsh is writing a letter to his younger sister Emmy to tell her the story of their mother's vicious abuse.

Callie and Matthew go to the Cumberland Farms store to get popsicles because there is a heatwave in the town in which they live.

Nikki is angry and sends a man called Rob to brutalize Murdoch.

Things are fine for a while until Nikki kidnaps Emmy and gets her drunk, although she is about eight years old.