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A review by rvbina
Concrete Rose by Angie Thomas
4.0
I write this review on the 1 year anniversary of Ahmed Arbery's death. It's been a whole year since his passing and there has been no justice for his murder by 3 armed, white, male, American civilians.
If you enjoyed THUG, you will love this book. Angie Thomas is amazing at what she does and I'm so glad she decided to write from a young black man's perspective. It's so heart warming to see Mav as a young black man who steps up to the challenge of being a young father, an amazing one at that. Maverick's level of education, his relationship status, his financial background and his criminal activity would make a lot of people strike him off and expect him to fail as a father but despite everything, he really does grow through what he goes through.
The biggest difference between this book and THUG was in me. When I read THUG I was so so ignorant to a lot of the struggle that black Americans have, but whilst reading Concrete Rose, I didn't learn much, if anything at all, about the social status of black people in America- which is a GOOD THING. It shouldn't take a YA book to teach you and me about black lives in America- we should be getting this information from the news, from educational institutions etc., which I'm glad to see is happening more and more frequently (though not frequently enough, and not in the right context).
And although I think that we shouldn't DEPEND on YA books to bring about change in ourselves, I'm going to contradict myself and say that a lot of the change I did see in myself was thanks to the likes of creators like Angie Thomas.
This book is brilliant and now I'm off to re-read THUG, and remind everyone on SM that Ahmed Arbery's family are yet to see justice served.
If you enjoyed THUG, you will love this book. Angie Thomas is amazing at what she does and I'm so glad she decided to write from a young black man's perspective. It's so heart warming to see Mav as a young black man who steps up to the challenge of being a young father, an amazing one at that. Maverick's level of education, his relationship status, his financial background and his criminal activity would make a lot of people strike him off and expect him to fail as a father but despite everything, he really does grow through what he goes through.
The biggest difference between this book and THUG was in me. When I read THUG I was so so ignorant to a lot of the struggle that black Americans have, but whilst reading Concrete Rose, I didn't learn much, if anything at all, about the social status of black people in America- which is a GOOD THING. It shouldn't take a YA book to teach you and me about black lives in America- we should be getting this information from the news, from educational institutions etc., which I'm glad to see is happening more and more frequently (though not frequently enough, and not in the right context).
And although I think that we shouldn't DEPEND on YA books to bring about change in ourselves, I'm going to contradict myself and say that a lot of the change I did see in myself was thanks to the likes of creators like Angie Thomas.
This book is brilliant and now I'm off to re-read THUG, and remind everyone on SM that Ahmed Arbery's family are yet to see justice served.