At the time (circa 1997), the book took the Christian world by storm. I read it along with some of my girlfriends and soaked it up as an impressionable thirteen-year-old. I wanted to be pure, and I wanted to be good in God's eyes.
Following that book, I was inundated with messages encouraging me to save myself for marriage, to dress modestly, to be wary of dating, thinking of my future husband. While I know all of the messages (as well as their senders) were well-intentioned and earnest, at my age and with my little experience in the world of boys and girls, not much of it translated in a healthy way.
