Three Cybils titles...
All dealing with sexual assault! (WHEEEE!)
Don't get me wrong: It's an extremely relevant issue, and certainly one that deserves coverage. I was just thrown when I realized that I'd randomly picked up three books—each time, I closed my eyes and fished into the pile for the next book—in a row that all dealt with it in some way or another.
After this round I'm looking for something cheerfully boppy, dammit!
Exposed, by Kimberly Marcus
Exposed is a verse novel about Liz and her best friend, Kate. During their monthly Saturday Night Sleepover, they get into a fight and Liz stomps upstairs, leaving Kate to sleep alone.
That night, everything changes. With no explanation—the fight really wasn't that big a deal—though they'd been inseparable for years, Kate starts avoiding Liz.
Her behavior only becomes understandable later, when she accuses Liz's older brother of rape.
Exposed is about friendship and trust, family and ambition, guilt and betrayal. Although we never get Kate's side of the story directly—Liz narrates the whole thing—we get a very clear picture of her range of emotion, because, even from a distance, Liz knows her friend. And while she isn't always particularly stellar at her own personal relationships, her photographer's eye doesn't miss much when it comes to the nuances of other peoples' interactions.
Considering the roiling emotions and the plotline—which, SPOILER, includes a courtroom scene—it's a very quiet book. While there's certainly a depth of emotion here, the format and the extreme spareness of the poetry itself may not appeal to readers looking for something super-meaty. Then again, reluctant readers will be overjoyed about the amount of white space on each page...
Lark, by Tracey Porter
16-year-old Lark Austin is kidnapped, beaten, sexually assaulted and left for dead in the woods near her house, where she eventually dies of exposure.
Left behind are her childhood best friend, Eve, and a younger girl, Nyetta, who Lark used to babysit. In alternating voices—including Lark's—the girls tell the story of the aftermath. Lark shows Eve and Nyetta each navigating their own very different guilty feelings: Eve, because of a friendship that had faded away, and Nyetta, because she believes that she's the only one who can truly let Lark's spirit free.
As in Wintergirls, a girl is visited by the ghost of her dead friend. As in Wintergirls, whether or not that is actually, literally happening is arguable.
The girls' voices are all distinctly different, and the writing is simple and lovely and evocative and vivid:
I colored them so furiously I picked up the grain from the picnic table.
Sloshing through the creek in the culvert, we scraped a stick against the corrugated tin, the circle of light ahead of us tinged with green.
The subject matter will make this a tough one for some readers: Lark recounts exactly what happened to her, and it's an intensely disturbing and realistic scene. Like Exposed, it's short and it's spare, but it still allows for emotional connection with the characters. Even with the (depending on your take) ghost-y bits, it's a quiet, contemplative and sometimes dreamy read.
The Mockingbirds, by Daisy Whitney
Themis Academy caters to students so outstandingly impressive that the administration and staff find it impossible to believe that any of them could possibly behave in a less-than-exemplary manner. So, when a student is wronged, it's a well-known fact that going through official channels is completely useless.
Luckily for students like junior Alex Patrick—who wakes up one morning in a strange guy's bed with no memory of the previous night—there are the Mockingbirds: A student group that investigates claims of wrongdoing, provides the opportunity for the accused to refute the charges, and ultimately, a group that dispenses justice.
The Mockingbirds made a HUGE splash when it first came out. Which is totally understandable, because there's a lot to like: Alex's emotional journey as she struggles to remember what happened, her difficulty in deciding how to proceed, the fact that she worries constantly that she's remembering things wrong, how she feels pushed and pulled by the opinions of her friends... all of that rings very, very true. And everything about the inner workings of the Mockingbirds—from the checks and balances implemented to keep them honest to the use of a library book to pass messages on to the student body—is fascinating.
My only complaint was that all of the jerks—the rapist and his friends—were moustache-twirlers. At first, they seemed to be garden-variety jerks, but by the time the Mockingbird court was in session, they'd proved to be flat-out evil. And people are rarely that uncomplicated in real life. So, while it detracted from the book's strength, I can't imagine it'll preventing teen readers from enjoying it wholeheartedly.
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The Mockingbirds: Amazon | Indiebound.
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Book sources:
Exposed: Review copy from the publisher.
Lark: Personal copy.
The Mockingbirds: ILLed through my library.