I read this in roughly an hour so there's that. The book is completely from the POV of a single character written in the style of a one-sided conversation, that is you get his side and his responses to those he is talking to but none of their dialogue. Near the latter third of the book, you also get some letters written by the protagonist to his friend, the kid he babysat for about the old folks he takes care of through his job at a retirement home. I did not like this storytelling strategy at all. Through the course of this monologue/half-dialogue, the protagonist seems to grow and mature through his interactions with the kid and the elderly as he tries to start building a life. Frankly, I bought the book because of the cover, seems it promised me, hippies, I got this whatever the hell this was. Hated it though it was an easy read being YA. ( )