From Goodreads,
"Five months ago, Valerie Leftman's boyfriend, Nick, opened fire on their school cafeteria. Shot trying to stop him, Valerie inadvertently saved the life of a classmate, but was implicated in the shootings because of the list she helped create. A list of people and things she and Nick hated. The list he used to pick his targets.
Now, after a summer of seclusion, Val is forced to confront her guilt as she returns to school to complete her senior year. Haunted by the memory of the boyfriend she still loves and navigating rocky relationships with her family, former friends and the girl whose life she saved, Val must come to grips with the tragedy that took place and her role in it, in order to make amends and move on with her life."
Awards and Nominations:
- Michigan Library Association Thumbs Up! Award (2010)
- Milwaukee County Teen Book Award Nominee (2011)
- Missouri Gateway Readers Award (2012)
- Oklahoma Sequoyah Award for High School (2012)
- Lincoln Award Nominee (2014)
This is actually a reread for me, and I was not excited about it. As we all know I started reading through award-winning books a few years back. This was a book that was on the Missouri Gateway Readers Award list. I had read it before and found the book okay. Not great, not terrible, just okay. I didn't want to read it again but had made the agreement with myself to read through the award books and document it by writing reviews on this blog. Thus, I'm stuck rereading the book. The exciting part is that the copy I have has the novella in the back. I'll review it next week!
Valerie never wanted anyone to die. Sure she was different than most teenagers. Sure she had a hate list of all the things and people she hated. She never thought that her boyfriend Nick would take things so seriously and decide to shoot the kids at her school. Valerie too was a victim and now she is trying to recover in a million different ways. A lot of people think she is guilty and should pay for what she did, even though she did nothing but make the hate list. She is mentally trying to deal with and sort out her personal problems, her family problems, and all the problems that come from being at school. The entire time you will ask what exactly happen and will Valerie ever be okay.
In today's world, we see and hear more and more about school shootings. Schools practice lockdown drills and students know what to do in case they have to lock down a room by themselves or with a sub. A lot of books in the past ten years have had school shootings as a theme and central driving point behind the book. This book of course has the school shooting as a backdrop. But it isn't the driving point and focus of the book. Hate List focuses on Valerie and her role in the school shooting and more importantly her role after the shooting. I find it such an interesting approach by Brown because of Valerie's role. She made the hate list, but she had no idea there were plans for a school shooting and she ends up being a victim. Some people quickly forgive her and say she is innocent because she didn't shoot anyone. While others think she is to blame and should pay for it because she made the hate list. And through the entire book, we follow Valerie as she goes to a therapist to try to sort out her feelings and pull her life together in some way, shape, or form. There is a big mental health push in this book, and frankly, I think it was done so tastefully. At the end of the copy of the book I have, there's a question and answer session with Jennifer Brown. She states that she had come up with Valerie and laid out all the details of her. But she then had her husband who is a psychologist make a plan on how she would be treated. I think this was a wonderful approach by having someone who is a professional develop part of the book and determine how therapy would actually be for Valerie. The entire book was wonderfully written and laid together perfectly.
I stated earlier that this book was just okay on my scale. I think this is largely in part because of Valerie's entire dysfunctional family. Her dad honestly became the bad guy in this entire thing. He was an awful human being who blamed her for everything that had happened. He didn't give anyone in his family the love or support that they needed during a trying time. He was only focused on himself. Valerie's mom was pretty scattered. She went from thinking Valerie was going to try to kill herself to having complete trust in her, then swinging back to being paranoid and thinking she was going to kill people. Her mom should have also been going to therapy from what I read in the book. She was a lot to handle, but at the end of the day, she still loved Valerie which is more than I can say for Valerie's dad. Her brother seemed pretty supportive in the beginning, but he changed too as the book progressed. He became more like their dad and told Valerie to basically stop causing a scene and ruining things for him. I think they all needed to go to therapy together and separately. They were a ruining point for me because of how dysfunctional they all were.
This book wasn't as bad as I had remembered it being. I don't think this would be a perfect fit for just anyone. I think that anyone who is struggling with mental health issues might want to consider reading this book with a friend or family member. It touches on self-harm and obviously the school shooting. I give this 3 stars. The book was okay, but it just wasn't the book for me.
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