YouTube suicides, possible pregnancies, drug comedowns, and getting straight A's -- meet Jasper: a seventeen-year-old with his hands full. Weekdays are packed with visits to the psychologist, mounting parental pressure to achieve in school, scouring the Internet for porn, and trying to figure out whether his stepfather murdered his ex-wife. Weekends are focused on finding the next party, the best drugs, and sex --preferably with Georgia Treely -- but really with anyone he can get.

Brilliantly encapsulating the nihilistic and disaffected voice of a generation, Grow Up is a frank portrayal of one dark, funny, and twisted teen searching for his place in the world.

Ben Brooks was born in 1992 and lives in Gloucestershire, U.K. He is also the author of four other books, Fences, An Island of Fifty, The Kasahara School of Nihilism, and Upward Coast & Sadie. Brooks' work has been nominated for a Pushcart Prize and published in the Dzanc Best of the Web anthology.

Ben Brooks' profile page

... an undeniably fun read ...

Toronto Star

[Grow Up] explores generational angst and the blue-black damage of adolescence ... an epistolary novel filled with black humor and fleeting tenderness.

Kirkus Reviews