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A review by krish_
Knife Edge by Malorie Blackman
4.0
Knife Edge is a filler. It's narrative padding for the final installment in Malorie Blackman's Noughts and Crosses trilogy. Here, we continue Sephy's story. She's living on her own as a single mom to Callie Rose. She's turned her back on her family and community for their betrayal during , choosing to live instead in truth and squalor than hypocrisy and comfort. And Jude, Callum's older, much angrier brother who is on the run and hungry for Sephy's blood.
The plot is long, mainly uneventful and terribly suspended. So much happened in Noughts and Crosses that maybe Blackman felt like giving these two a break...? The racial intolerance and glaring animosity is just as harsh, perhaps even worse than before, and it serves as pointed reminders, painful nudges, of just how bad this alternate England of Blackman's is. Out in the open people persecute Sephy for what she did, as she now becomes poster child for "blanker-lovers" everywhere. People, both Crosses and noughts, torment her for the choices she's made but oh, how misguided they are! But the real torture, the source of true searing hate and torn allegiances in this novel is within Sephy and Jude themselves.
And that's why, despite all the narrative lapses this book commits, I must give it a four. Because even though this book didn't go where I wanted it to, my unhealthy hunger for emotional masochism was satisfied. The self-reflections were a tad heavy, bordering on "emo" I might even say, but I still felt the pain and the longing and the guilt and regret and confusion. And the anger, and frustration and desperation. And hope, and love. Enough? Because there's still loneliness (incredible loneliness), indifference and hate. No one is more shamed and bewildered by the racial segregation than Sephy. No one harbors more spite for it than Jude. Except Sephy acts towards pacifying the divide, while Jude can't help but reinforce it.
Blackman does a good job at blurring the lines. Not one side is right. Neither side of anything is ever fully right. The point isn't that black is right and white is wrong. The point isn't to preach but teach. The only thing this book wants is for it to stop. Sephy loses faith all the time. Jude fails us over and over again. The entire society breaks them down in ways that are difficult to digest. We see prejudice and injustice bring out the worst in them. But we also see their desperate fight to keep the good. And in a world that threatens to deplete you of all sympathies, that's all we can really hope to do.
Spoiler
Callum's arrest and executionThe plot is long, mainly uneventful and terribly suspended. So much happened in Noughts and Crosses that maybe Blackman felt like giving these two a break...? The racial intolerance and glaring animosity is just as harsh, perhaps even worse than before, and it serves as pointed reminders, painful nudges, of just how bad this alternate England of Blackman's is. Out in the open people persecute Sephy for what she did, as she now becomes poster child for "blanker-lovers" everywhere. People, both Crosses and noughts, torment her for the choices she's made but oh, how misguided they are! But the real torture, the source of true searing hate and torn allegiances in this novel is within Sephy and Jude themselves.
And that's why, despite all the narrative lapses this book commits, I must give it a four. Because even though this book didn't go where I wanted it to, my unhealthy hunger for emotional masochism was satisfied. The self-reflections were a tad heavy, bordering on "emo" I might even say, but I still felt the pain and the longing and the guilt and regret and confusion. And the anger, and frustration and desperation. And hope, and love. Enough? Because there's still loneliness (incredible loneliness), indifference and hate. No one is more shamed and bewildered by the racial segregation than Sephy. No one harbors more spite for it than Jude. Except Sephy acts towards pacifying the divide, while Jude can't help but reinforce it.
Blackman does a good job at blurring the lines. Not one side is right. Neither side of anything is ever fully right. The point isn't that black is right and white is wrong. The point isn't to preach but teach. The only thing this book wants is for it to stop. Sephy loses faith all the time. Jude fails us over and over again. The entire society breaks them down in ways that are difficult to digest. We see prejudice and injustice bring out the worst in them. But we also see their desperate fight to keep the good. And in a world that threatens to deplete you of all sympathies, that's all we can really hope to do.