REVIEW: Cold Hands, Warm Heart by Jill Wolfson

Title: Cold Hands, Warm Heart

Author: Jill Wolfson

Publication Date: October 30^th 2012

Publisher: Square Fish

Format: Paperback

Pages: 272

Rating: 4/5
Blurb: Dani was born with her heart on the wrong side of her body. In her fifteen years of life, she’s had more doctor’s appointments, X-rays, and tests, and eaten more green hospital Jell-O than she cares to think about. Fourteen-year-old Amanda is a competitive gymnast, her body a small package of sleek muscles, in perfect health. The two girls don’t know each other, don’t go to the same school, don’t have any friends in common. But their lives are about to collide.

Acclaimed author Jill Wolfson tackles this fascinating story with her trademark honesty and wit.

Review: Before actually picking this book up and borrowing it from my school library I had never heard of it before and I had absolutely no knowledge as to what it was about except from what I read on the back. I wasn’t immediately sure that I’d enjoy this book- I spent most of my childhood in and out of hospital so I felt like I’d be able to connect with Dani, however there was a small part of me that worried that she may become one of those characters who only complains about how ‘hard’ her life is- I really didn’t need to worry at all.

Dani turned out to be a really interesting character. While she had her moments where her life was just a bit too hard for her, Jill Wolfson carefully created those moments so that it wasn’t boring or annoying but instead you felt pity for Dani and at least for me, I could understand a bit of what she was going for. I enjoyed most of the other characters- Milo (another hospital patient) who was a little strange and morbid at times, but still a very interesting character, Tyler (Amanda’s older brother) who annoyed me for the first few chapters but over time, I grew to feel more sorry for him than for anyone else. One thing that did surprise me was the real lack of Amanda, from the blurb I thought that the two main voices would be Dani and Amanda but this was not the case at all.

The book surprised me, again, with the fact that it wasn’t one of those completely heartbreaking The Fault In Our Stars type books, not to say that I don’t enjoy those as well. I loved the fact that the book wasn’t all about life and death and hanging in the balance, it had its light, funny moments but it also had those heartwrenching moments that didn’t directly connect to death which in a way, made it the entire novel even more heartbreaking.

While the topic of organ donors and its effects was not something that I could relate to, I believe that the characters and writing is this book draw you in and make you feel like you can relate- like you are member of Dani or Amanda’s families or that you’re a kid waiting for that second chance at life.

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