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How long does it take to read Collateral?

Ellen Hopkins

Collateral by Ellen Hopkins takes about 9 hours 6 minutes to read at 250 words a minute.

About 9 hours 6 minutes

A week or two of reading

First published 2012. 496 pages, about 136,400 words.

19 days at 30 minutes a day

Estimate based on 275 words per page.

At other speeds

Slow, 150 words a minute 15 hours 9 minutes
Average, 250 words a minute 9 hours 6 minutes
Fast, 400 words a minute 5 hours 41 minutes

The page count is the median across 1 edition, so your copy may differ. How we calculate.

About the book

Meet Ashley, a graduate student at San Diego State University. She was raised in northern California reading poetry and singing back-up in her best friend’s band. The last thing she ever expected was to end up a military wife. But one night, she meets a handsome Marine named Cole. He doesn’t match the stereotype of the aggressive military man she’d always presumed to be true; he’s passionate and romantic, and he even writes poetry. Their relationship evolves into a deeply felt, sexually charged love affair that goes on for five years and survives four deployments. Cole desperately wants Ashley to marry him, but when she meets another man, a college professor, with similar professional pursuits and values, she begins to see what life might be like outside the shadow of war. Written in Ellen Hopkins’s stunning poetic verse style, Collateral captures the hearts of the soldiers on the battlefield and the minds of the friends, family, and lovers they leave behind. While those at home may be far from the relentless, sand-choked skies of the Middle East and the crosshairs of a sniper rifle, they too sacrifice their lives and happiness for their country at war. And all must eventually ask themselves if the collateral damage it causes is worth the fight.

Subjects: Armed Forces, Man-woman relationships, Military life, United States. Marine Corps, Single women, Fiction

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