Freewill Genre

Young Adult Literature; Coming-of-Age

Freewill is about a seventeen-year-old boy struggling with depression and grief about the death of his parents. It has heavy themes—death, suicide, mental health, to name a few—and they are filtered through the thoughts of a young adult who has some serious self-esteem issues and a lot of angst about his future. With its second-person narration style (read up on that in the "Narration Point of View" section), this book is all about being a teenager. And for all of these reasons, it's definitely in the young adult literature genre.

Though Will is in a bad place emotionally, though, he ultimately snaps out of it through woodwork, tough love, and threats that push him to his limit. And when he does, all of a sudden he stops feeling like a victim in his life, and starts to feel in charge of his own destiny. So though he's still seventeen when the book ends, we're calling this one a coming-of-age story as well. Will may not technically age much, but he sure does come into his own, even if it takes him most of the book to so do.