Reviews with content warning for Domestic abuse - Dear Justyce

Reviews tagging 'Domestic abuse'

Dear Justyce by Nic Stone

33 reviews

onemorepagecrew's review against another edition

emotional reflective sad medium-paced

Plot- or character-driven? A mix
Strong character development? Yes
Loveable characters? Yes
Diverse cast of characters? Yes
Flaws of characters a main focus? Yes

5.0

Nic Stone is a gift to young readers. I have followed her on social media for years and I admire her writing, so I decided to re-read (listen) to Dear Martin and Dear Justyce. They were just as good as I remembered, and I flew through them. In the first book, Dear Martin, we meet Justyce who is an honor student at a private school and working on his college applications. The story shows him experiencing high school life and how he handles friendships, teachers, and a crush. He is facing microaggressions and outright racism at school and then has two encounters with the police that change his life forever. Justyce is writing to Martin Luther King, Jr. through out the book asking for guidance to navigate his life experiences.

In the second book, Dear Justyce, the timeline picks up with Justyce at Yale University and we get a chance to know Quan, who was a peripheral character in the first book, much better. Quan is incarcerated in a youth detention center and writing letters to Justyce as he grapples with the circumstances that led him to this situation. In their correspondence and in Quan’s reflections we see a deeper story and it’s a creative way to let the story and characters live on while showing a different angle.

If you haven’t read these books, I highly recommend that you do. They are Young Adult however the depth makes them a great read for adults too. They shine a light on unsafe and unfair experiences for Black boys and Black men in the U.S. and while this is fiction, the situations are not. I’ll end this as I started it - Nic Stone is a gift to young readers.

Content Warnings