After a bad day at school, eighth grader Brent Runyon comes home, plays a little basketball with his brother, then goes inside, soaks his bathrobe ...
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Dec 17, 2009
Karen
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At age fourteen Brent Runyon came home from a bad day at school, doused himself with gasoline, and lit a match. Immediately, he regretted his painful suicide attempt. By the time help came he had already suffered second and third degree burns to 85% of his body. The stuff of dark fiction? No, the memoir of a young man whose story is as compelling as it is horrifying. Though Brent survived, the following months were undoutbedly the most painful of his life. He went through skin grafts, burn tr
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Aug 26, 2008
Iamshadow
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Oct 19, 2007
Ashley
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FIRST - this book should not be placed in the Young Adult section. I know that it's based on when he was a teen but it's got so much talk about sex, drugs and every other word seems like a cuss word. Just doesn't seem teen appropriate for me. Plus I don't think a teenager would be able to understand or connect with the book and it's subject matters.
This book was very helpful on giving insight on what it's like for people who have had something happened to them or feel out of the or More...
This book was very helpful on giving insight on what it's like for people who have had something happened to them or feel out of the or More...
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Oct 03, 2008
M
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I had heard nothing but good reviews of this book. It's a memoir about a young boy who attempted suicide by burning and his recovery. While an interesting and honest read by turns, I felt only half of the story was being told. Perhaps that's all the author was dealing with at the time - or at the time of the writing. In either case, I felt that the emotional and psychological aspects of this journey were missing. That really left me flat. Not that I expected the answer to life's big questions, b
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Mar 08, 2009
Engrossing from first page to last, this book based on Runyon's own adolescent experiences draws readers into the world of an eighth-grader whose life is irrevocably changed the day he deliberately sets himself on fire. Brent, after narrowly escaping death, wakes up in a hospital with 85% of his body severely burned and begins a slow, arduous path to recovery. Rather than analyzing reasons the patient wanted to kill himself, the first-person narrative remains focused on the immediate challenge o
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Mar 06, 2009
The book that I read is an intense autobiography titled The Burn Journals by Brent Runyon. Through out this extraordinary book you will come to admire the little that you have and harbor the life you live. I mean you really will start to look at a minute as a fresh breath of new air, a sight of beautiful surroundings instead of just 60 seconds in an hour. I decided to give this book a try based on the captivating cover. I notice that the word burn was in a larger text than the other words.
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Mar 01, 2009
Karrie
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I'm not a child psychologist so I don't always understand why teens gravitate towards books that are depressing, full of angst, always about incredible situations that most people don't find themselves in. Perhaps they need to read a story that is worse than their own perceived drama. I've worked with teenagers long enough to know that they feel their problems are the biggest and worst of anyone they know. They all worry about being popular and being picked on. They all worry that their
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(1 person liked it)
Dec 20, 2008
Systemofadownlover
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My teacher recommended this book for me, and I really am glad he did. I have never read a "present tense", or whatever it may be called, before. That is why I really liked it. It added a lot to the book. Brent Runyon did a fantastic job of showing me how he feels and what he was thinking. I cried during this book. It is so touching and just amazing. Everything he wrote painted an image in my head, which added to why I love it so much.
The book is about Brent who is what I More...
The book is about Brent who is what I More...
Oct 31, 2011
Sammi
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The Burn Journals by Brent Runyon is a very somber book telling the story of why Brent doused himself in gasoline and lit himself on fire. He also shares the path he took to recovery and how many times he could have just given up. Brent wrote this book as part of his recovery and never expected it to be shared with others.
The theme is between a self-help book and a autobiography. He was trying to use this book as a way to help him overcome his life changing expierence and also so people ca More...
The theme is between a self-help book and a autobiography. He was trying to use this book as a way to help him overcome his life changing expierence and also so people ca More...
Sep 21, 2011
Emilee
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I think this is a great book! It is very suspenseful and entertaining, and I never wanted to put it down. It's a non-fiction story about a suicidal teenager named Brent. He wrote this story when he got older as an opportunity to let go of his past and move on to better things. I think he's trying to tell his readers that even if things get bad, they can get better again, and that when you're going through a hard time, to not turn to hurting yourself. In the story, he says that he regrets ever hu
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May 04, 2011
Christian
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The Burn Journals is about Brent Runyon, who is 14 years old. He's popular, funny, and smart. But all of that is about to quickly change for him. During gym class, Brent thought it would be funny to light a shirt on fire. He does so, but soon the flame becomes to large to control. Out of impulse, Brent throws the shirt into a gym locker and he joins the rest of the gym class. The school gets the police into the business, and in fear Brent knows he's going to be in trouble, so he decides he's goi
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Apr 10, 2011
Molly
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The Burn Journals by Brent Runyon is a memoir about a short period of time in the author's life during which he recovered from his first fatal suicide attempt. After dealing with severe depression for several years and also developing a record of not-so-stellar behavior, the author decides one day at the age of 14 that he is going to set himself on fire. Dousing himself in gasoline and laying in the bathtub after school, Brent lights the match that ultimately changes his life.
The next tim More...
The next tim More...
Mar 10, 2011
2ryanj
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“The Burn Journals” by Brent Runyon is about a 14-year-old, in 1991, who went home, put on his robe, poured gasoline all over himself, and lit a match. Even though he meant to kill himself, he couldn’t bare the pain, and he turned on the shower. He suffered 3rd degree burn all over his body. He was immediately rushed to a hospital in D.C. and got treated for the next four months. During those four months he had to learn how to do many things over again, including walk, eat, and breathe. After
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Mar 03, 2011
1danif
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The Burn Journals is about a 14 year old boy who is majorly depressed. He comes home from school one afternoon and goes into the bathroom. He pours gasoline all over his bathroom and lights himself up. Right away, he can't stand it. He gasps for air and runs out the door. His brother sees him and immediately calls 911. So many things are going through Brent's head. He can't take it. He is in a lot of pain but shortly after the ambulance shows up and takes him to the hospital. Brent spends a very
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Feb 25, 2011
Katelyn
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I thought this was a really good book. It starts with a 14 year old boy who is severely depressed, has attempted suicide 3 times, and he gets into trouble at school. When he was about to get expelled from school he decided he didn't want to live anymore. So, he tells people he is going to kill himself and he actually goes home and goes through with the plan. He gets in the bathtub and puts on a gasoline covered robe and lights a match. After he does he realizes that he made a bad choice and can'
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Jan 26, 2011
Anna
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This book is about the author's experience as a 14-year-old-8th-grader almost succeeding in his largest attempt at suicide he ever underwent. Brent was very depressed as a child, and he felt that he couldn't get anything right. His grades took a plunge as he finished 7th grade and started 8th. He cut himself, attempted to hang himself and he finally was pushed over the edge after he was bound to get expelled for setting a shirt on fire in a locker with a full pack of matches. His mind told him h
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Jan 15, 2011
Courtney
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On February 4, 1991, fourteen-year-old Brent Runyon comes home from school, douses his bathrobe in gasoline, puts it on, and lights himself on fire. It doesn’t go the way he planned. He doesn’t die.
When I started reading this I didn’t realize it was autobiographical. The novel feels like fiction because Runyon isn’t writing a memoir. He writes in first person, present tense. Ignoring what my brain knew about real-time, I felt like nothing had happened to Brent until I made it happen b More...
When I started reading this I didn’t realize it was autobiographical. The novel feels like fiction because Runyon isn’t writing a memoir. He writes in first person, present tense. Ignoring what my brain knew about real-time, I felt like nothing had happened to Brent until I made it happen b More...
Jan 14, 2011
Devon
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Overall, The Burn Journals isn't much fun, but that doesn't mean it shouldn't be read. A grim story that can give you a new perspective can be worth a million pages of the same old thing. Unless you have intimate experience with severe burn trauma and recovery, you'll definitely get a new perspective here.
The writing style makes it an easy read, almost too easy, considering the seriousness of the content. Brent is very good at conveying his physical age, psychological state and emotional m More...
The writing style makes it an easy read, almost too easy, considering the seriousness of the content. Brent is very good at conveying his physical age, psychological state and emotional m More...
Dec 03, 2010
Mike
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'The Burn Journals' comes across as a very honest account of Brent Runyon's very tragic suicide attempt, background leading up to it, and the aftermath in physical recovery. What frustrated me about the book is that he does not go into at all why he did it. It's really up to the reader to infer the cause. The book would be more satisfying to me if there was an epilogue that included a refection on what happened and what he did to get to the bottom of why he did this. Compare this to 'Girl, Inter
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Nov 11, 2010
This book The Burn Journals is a very interesting book, the author Brent Runyon wrote it to pretty much perfection. I have never read a book with so many descriptive words on a single page or a paragraph. He almost made it feel like I was the one watching this book in life, like watching someone burn them and watching it all happen right in front of me. I mainly like books that are being written about someone near my age than maybe being older or younger than I am. The boy in this book is 14 yea
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Oct 27, 2010
Andrew
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The book i read was The Burn Journals by Brent Runyon. The Burn Journals is a Memoir. Its about a kid named Brent and he is in 8th grade and talk's about killing himself a lot. Him and his friends like to mess around in school and one day he set a t-shirt on fire in the locker room and put it in a locker. If the school found out it was him he was going to get expelled. He thought that if he got expelled his parents would hate him. So one da when he got home he went to the shed and got the ga
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Oct 21, 2010
Daniel
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After finish reading this book “The Burn Journals”, I read some book reviews about it, and discover that 90 per cent of the readers show that this is an enlightening book to read. Although some readers show some different opinions about the book, but most people really enjoy reading it. One thing can be sure, this is a worth book to read for teenagers and adults. The reason I say that is because younger teenagers might not be able to really understand the stories.
Brent Runyon is talk More...
Brent Runyon is talk More...
Oct 13, 2010
Jazmine
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This book came to me accidently, My friend placed this book in my bag one day at school it stayed there for months till I finally decided to pick it up. As I started to read something just clicked, not in a I'm saved sort of way, but in a I know what he means.
Personally as a 15yr old Teenager I enjoyed this book in a very bittersweet way. Many people forget or don't understand that teenagers do in fact feel emotion even if it is not racinal. I was, well still sor More...
Personally as a 15yr old Teenager I enjoyed this book in a very bittersweet way. Many people forget or don't understand that teenagers do in fact feel emotion even if it is not racinal. I was, well still sor More...
Aug 01, 2010
Audra
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At fourteen, Runyon put on his bathrobe, doused it with gasoline, stepped into the tub and lit himself on fire. He suffered third-degree burns over 85 percent of his body. He endured months of excruciating skin grafts and physical therapy. The Burn Journals spans Runyon's first year of recovery from this horrifying suicide attempt as he struggles with the pain, the guilt and the questions from himself and others as to why he did it.
This book does not contain any solutions or answers More...
This book does not contain any solutions or answers More...
Jul 10, 2010
Terry
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Mar 24, 2010
Kazi
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The book “The Burn Journals” by Brent Runyon was a book that I have enjoyed reading this month. The conflict of this book had started when a boy named Adam brought a pack of matches to school and showed Brent Runyon during gym class in the locker room. Brent took it and lit one on fire, then, to show off and because he thought it was funny, he lit the whole thing on fire and they had an accident in the locker room. So Brent opened some windows to cover his tracks but the principle found out what
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Oct 15, 2009
Barky
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This is the true story of Brent Runyon’s suicide attempt and recovery from the same. Brent is in 8th grade when he decides that he’s going to kill himself. This isn’t the first time he’s decided this either, but all of his other suicide attempts have failed. He’s tried slitting his wrists several times, but in each case didn’t make the cuts deep enough. He’s also tried overdosing on Advil, but 20 pills only made him sleepy. If you ask him why he wanted to die, he can’t even really explain i
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Apr 26, 2009
Cornmaven
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Sep 30, 2010
Evan
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Burn journals by Brent Runyon auto biography
The burn journals was a great book, it showed me that reading is actually nice. Before this book I hated reading and got put into a reading class at school. My English teacher and my reading teacher were talking about this and it caught my attention. This book is about a young boy who is extremely sad and tries to attempt many suicides but he would either stand up before he would pass out or he wouldn’t cut himself deep enough. One day More...
The burn journals was a great book, it showed me that reading is actually nice. Before this book I hated reading and got put into a reading class at school. My English teacher and my reading teacher were talking about this and it caught my attention. This book is about a young boy who is extremely sad and tries to attempt many suicides but he would either stand up before he would pass out or he wouldn’t cut himself deep enough. One day More...
May 13, 2010
Evelcheck
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In The Burn Journals, a memoir, the author Brent Runyon tells a shocking story about when he was fourteen years old and tried to committee suicide. One day, Brent sets off to kill him self, he goes into his garage gets a tub of gasoline and a box of matches from the kitchen. Brent than goes up to his second story bathroom and locks the doors behind him, he steps in the shower, douses his bath robe in gasoline and drapes the drenched robe over his bare shoulders. With a box of matches in hand Bre
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