You need to sign in or sign up before continuing.
Take a photo of a barcode or cover
miloulou 's review for:
What We Saw
by Aaron Hartzler
This was excellent. I could definitely tell it was inspired by specific events about the rape in a small town in the States, Anonymous, the football team, and so many other details I haven't thought about in the two years since it happened. I still remember talking about it in my high school class, wondering how on earth an entire school could cover up such an obvious crime; there were pictures online any one could see proving what had happened. And yet that entire town protected them and shunned the girl, much like what happens in this novel.
*
*
*
*
*
** spoilers **
*
*
*
*
*
A lot of YA novels deal with the girl, the victim of the rape, and how she tries to move on. This one, I think, is a really important one. Highlighting the bystanders around, all the other people who saw and know what happened but say nothing. It has such an important message and doesn't try to hide the horrible nature of how there are so many other things outside of just speaking up.
Kate has four best friends. She's just starting to date the guy of her dreams, her childhood best friend, and in the beginning it reads much like the ending of most contemporary YA novels. But this story isn't about the romance, and in that, it feels a lot more mature.
This story is about change, and how making the right choice can mean sacrificing everything. In the end, Kate loses all of her friends, her spot on the soccer team, her boyfriend, switches schools... and learns that things change. It really is a quiet kind of heartbreak. The quiet acceptance that things will never be the same, and she'll never be able to go back to what once was. I almost starting crying, thinking about how much she yearns to have it again.
It would be so scary to have to deal with that. To know that Ben, her boyfriend for most of the novel, knew exactly what happened that night. And he took her home. When she was drunk and wasted, had a picture with the very same victim of that night, she got taken home instead. Tucked inside, driven home inside her truck so she wouldn't get in trouble. All because he loved her, cared about her, because she wasn't a "slut".
That word carries a lot of meaning in high school. Beyond just sleeping around with guys. It means that you're less. Less human, less important, that all you are is summed up in one word and that people don't feel bad when they treat you like shit. And that's what happens to Stacey in this novel. She's just a body for the basketball players to use, as they laugh, and it makes me sick thinking about the video of the Tracies who are watching and laughing.
What's particularly scary about this book is how successfully it humanizes a lot of the characters. Not the criminals, so much as they're not really even a part of the novel. But the bystanders. All the other classmates as they discuss what happens. Discussing the unspoken rules of what girls have to act like to be respected. What girls act like to be considered a slut. What guys are allowed to do, and what you have to turn a blind eye to to be considered one of them. The whole herd mentality is so strong in high school when you have to spend over eight hours with the same people all day, and especially for people who are part of any extracurriculars through the school.
This book was a really important read, adding to the ongoing conversation of rape and consent. Being in university now and no longer high school, it's still such a big conversation. I'm glad this book exists to encourage people to speak up, and really think about what's going on around them instead of quietly accepting things as they have always been.
*
*
*
*
*
** spoilers **
*
*
*
*
*
A lot of YA novels deal with the girl, the victim of the rape, and how she tries to move on. This one, I think, is a really important one. Highlighting the bystanders around, all the other people who saw and know what happened but say nothing. It has such an important message and doesn't try to hide the horrible nature of how there are so many other things outside of just speaking up.
Kate has four best friends. She's just starting to date the guy of her dreams, her childhood best friend, and in the beginning it reads much like the ending of most contemporary YA novels. But this story isn't about the romance, and in that, it feels a lot more mature.
This story is about change, and how making the right choice can mean sacrificing everything. In the end, Kate loses all of her friends, her spot on the soccer team, her boyfriend, switches schools... and learns that things change. It really is a quiet kind of heartbreak. The quiet acceptance that things will never be the same, and she'll never be able to go back to what once was. I almost starting crying, thinking about how much she yearns to have it again.
It would be so scary to have to deal with that. To know that Ben, her boyfriend for most of the novel, knew exactly what happened that night. And he took her home. When she was drunk and wasted, had a picture with the very same victim of that night, she got taken home instead. Tucked inside, driven home inside her truck so she wouldn't get in trouble. All because he loved her, cared about her, because she wasn't a "slut".
That word carries a lot of meaning in high school. Beyond just sleeping around with guys. It means that you're less. Less human, less important, that all you are is summed up in one word and that people don't feel bad when they treat you like shit. And that's what happens to Stacey in this novel. She's just a body for the basketball players to use, as they laugh, and it makes me sick thinking about the video of the Tracies who are watching and laughing.
What's particularly scary about this book is how successfully it humanizes a lot of the characters. Not the criminals, so much as they're not really even a part of the novel. But the bystanders. All the other classmates as they discuss what happens. Discussing the unspoken rules of what girls have to act like to be respected. What girls act like to be considered a slut. What guys are allowed to do, and what you have to turn a blind eye to to be considered one of them. The whole herd mentality is so strong in high school when you have to spend over eight hours with the same people all day, and especially for people who are part of any extracurriculars through the school.
This book was a really important read, adding to the ongoing conversation of rape and consent. Being in university now and no longer high school, it's still such a big conversation. I'm glad this book exists to encourage people to speak up, and really think about what's going on around them instead of quietly accepting things as they have always been.