Explains the epidemic of self-cutting, how it can be an act of suicide, but is most often a misguided attempt at self-preservation.

Charlotte Davis is in pieces. At seventeen she's already lost more than most people lose in a lifetime. But she's learned how to forget. The broken glass washes away the sorrow until there is nothing but calm. You don't have to think about your father and the river. Your best friend, who is gone forever. Or your mother, who has nothing left to give you. Every new scar hardens Charlie's heart just a little more, yet it still hurts so much. It hurts...

Sixteen-year-old Willow, who was driving the car that killed both of her parents, copes with the pain and guilt by cutting herself, until she meets a smart and sensitive boy who is determined to help her stop.

A discussion of cutting and self-injury, explaining what it is and why it happens, encouraging young people to seek help from a trusted adult, and including coping strategies.

David Fitzpatrick's Sharp is an extraordinary memoir-a fascinating, disturbing look into the mind of a man who, in his early 20s, began cutting himself due to a severe mental illness. A beautifully written treatment of a powerful subject, Fitzpatrick-whose symptoms included extreme depression and self-mutilation-writes movingly and honestly about his affliction and inspires readers with his courage, joining the literary ranks of Terri Cheney (Manic),...

As a young college graduate a year into treatment with a psychiatrist, Cree LeFavour's began to organize her days around the cruel, compulsive logic of self-harm: with each newly lit cigarette, the world would drop away as her focus narrowed to an unblemished patch of skin calling out for attention and the fierce, blooming release of pleasure-pain as the burning tip was applied to the skin. Her body was a canvas of cruelty; each scar a mark of pride...

When desperately unhappy Laura, who secretly performs self-mutilation, finds her talisman and transports to Fortezza, a parallel world that resembles the Italian Renaissance city-state of Lucca, she faces battles on the field and of the heart.

Mia is officially a Troubled Teen. She gets bad grades, drinks too much, and has probably gone too far with too many guys. But she doesn't realize how out of control she seems until she is taken from her home in the middle of the night and sent away to Red Oak Academy, a therapeutic girls' boarding school in the middle of nowhere. While there, Mia is forced to confront her painful past at the same time she questions why she's at Red Oak. If she were...

Willa seems to have a perfect life as a member of a loving blended family until the estranged father she barely remembers murders his wife and children, then heads toward Willa and her mother.

Describes cutting and other forms of self-mutilation and people who harm themselves because of overwhelming emotional pain.