Title/Author: Don’t Touch by Rachel M. Wilson
Publication Date/Publisher: September 2, 2014/Harper Teen
Series: No
Source and Format: I received this book for free from the publisher via Edelweiss. This in no way affected my opinion of the book, or the content of my review.
Rating: 2 stars
From Goodreads:
Step on a crack, break your mother’s back. Touch another person’s skin, and Dad’s gone for good.Caddie can’t stop thinking that if she keeps from touching another person’s skin, her parents might get back together… which is why she wears full-length gloves to school and covers every inch of her skin.
It seems harmless at first, but Caddie’s obsession soon threatens her ambitions as an actress. She desperately wants to play Ophelia in her school’s production of Hamlet. But that would mean touching Peter, who’s auditioning for the title role—and kissing him. Part of Caddie would love nothing more than to kiss Peter—but the other part isn’t sure she’s brave enough to let herself fall.
WHY ARE YOU AT ACTING SCHOOL is the thing I thought most while reading Don’t Touch. I didn’t feel Caddie’s connection to acting or performing at all. It seems like the author just wanted Don’t Touch to take place in a setting where it was believable that the MC would be spending a lot of time as Ophelia for all the literary allusions and SHAKESPEARE! Metaphors! ACTING! For someone who is so afraid of everything, it seems like ACTING! would not be something Caddie is comfortable with.
I like books I can connect with, or books that give me something to relate to. I’ve had the odd panic attack, but don’t suffer from anxiety disorder or OCD. So, the actual “no touching” and the rules and everything was a little strange for me to believe – especially when Caddie really wants Peter to touch her. The whole thing of stemming from her parents separating was also weird for me – my parents divorced before I was old enough to make memories and subsequent divorces were not especially hard on me, so this isn’t something I can sympathize with either.
Caddie is short for Cadence, and whenever I remembered that I completely could not figure out how Caddie should be pronounced. At one point a golf joke is made, but I don’t understand how that is a shortened version of Cadence – which is apparently a family name? Her brother, Jordan, really got lucky in the naming department.
Other stray observations:
So, so, so repetitive. “No, I know” is used in what feels like every conversation.
“Peter has biceps” cool so does EVERYONE
For a second, I think she means, “pick sides,” like we’re going to have to battle one another to make it to the stage, but no, by “sides,” she means copies of the scenes we’ll be reading: WHY ARE YOU AT ACTING SCHOOL
Paperback Heart 
This book has been on my radar, but I’m glad you reviewed it because it doesn’t look like I will be picking this one up.