Living in Suspension — Winifred Morris

Like a fly caught in a web -- paralyzed, just hanging there...
That's how Sky feels at school. At least he has a creative writing class he likes, and although he's taking it for a make-up credit, it draws honor students like Julie as well as ones who have flunked. He watches her from the other side of the room and wishes he could be good enough for her. But he's always picked his friends from the losers, and his best friend is now pulling him even further down. As his life spins out of control, he finds refuge in “Escape from the Death Squad,” a novel he's writing about hovercrafts, mutant possums, a desperate flight to the Forbidden Hills -- and his fear that something must be wrong with him.
From the author of Liar comes this powerful and honest story of a teenager struggling to know himself.