Impulse (Hopkins novel)

Impulse

Author	Ellen Hopkins
Language	English
Genre	Young Adult
Publisher	Simon & Schuster
Publication date	2007
Publication place	United States
Pages	688
ISBN	ISBN 978-1416903567 (first edition, hardback)
OCLC	67405455
LC Class	PZ7.H7747 Imp 2007

Impulse is a 2007 American young adult novel in verse written by Ellen Hopkins.

Summary

Three troubled teens cross paths at Aspen Springs, a psychiatric hospital, after attempting suicide. Conner, Tony, and Vanessa all have demons that try to pull them under and get them to succumb to the temptation to try it again; this time making sure they succeed.

Conner's overbearing family, only concerned about his GPA, being like his perfect sister, his making the varsity football team, or getting into an Ivy League college, offer no solace during his time of need. Feeling suicide is the only answer after a deeply emotional and controversial love affair ends, he takes a gun and points it to his chest before pulling the trigger, but the bullet hits bone and missed his heart completely. During his stay, Conner finds out what friendship really means and makes deep bonds with his two new friends.

Tony, after many years in a juvenile home for killing his mother's perverse boyfriend Larry, dealing with his mother's uncaring attitude, and constantly struggling with being gay, decides to ease his feelings of despair and loneliness by swallowing a handful of pills, only to vomit and find that he swallowed the wrong pills, and being found by the police. He is then sent to the "Loony Bin" (as he describes) and falls in love with Vanessa.

Vanessa is a cutter. In order to ease her mind in any time of stress she slices her skin with anything sharp enough to do the job. One day, when she was drowning in her blue ocean of sadness, she cuts her wrist deeply enough to kill herself. She feels herself slipping into the abyss until her younger brother, Bryan, walks in and finds her. When he calls for their ex-nurse Grandma, she is able to hold off death. Vanessa nearly lost her hand, which had to be sewn back on. She, too, falls in love with Tony. She is bipolar, inheirited from her mother, which causes her to often be chronically depressed(blue) or unhealthily fearless or happy(white). Her mother takes too many pills on the day she decides to kill herself and must stay in the hospital for the rest of her life.

After arriving at Aspen Springs, Conner, Tony, and Vanessa are introduced to a life under constant survalence, strict routines, and much counseling. Soon the three form a bond, feeling drawn to one another as if they might be able to find solace. Together they navigate the regulations of the hospital and make progress toward healing as they tell each other their deepest, darkest secrets; things they won't even tell their counselors.

But while the three are on a Wilderness Challenge to prove that they can make it after they've left Aspen Springs, Conner has a severe relapse, and spirals back into a deep depression. He'd decided to quit his pills cold-turkey, and though Tony knows he doesn't tell the taskmasters, Sean and Raven. When Conner gets a note from his mother that lets him know that when he gets back home everything will be exactly the same he thinks that he'll never be able to escape his overbearing family. On top of that he believes he'll never find anyone to love him and he'll never be able to love because of his past, which makes him quietly resent the true love Tony and Vanessa have found. After finishing a challenge in which he had to climb to the top of a mountain he starts to think about his life and how it will only become worse. He steps to the edge of the cliff, seeing his mother, sister, and father inside his own mind, then steps off to his death.

Sources

• http://www.amazon.com/Impulse-Ellen-Hopkins/dp/1416903569