Goodreads: The Hate U Give
Genre: Young Adult Contemporary, Contemporary Fiction
Reviewed: August 2018
Panda Rating:
“What’s the point of having a voice if you’re gonna be silent in those moments you shouldn’t be?”
Sixteen-year-old Starr lives in two worlds: the poor neighbourhood where she was born and raised and her posh high school in the suburbs. The uneasy balance between them is shattered when Starr is the only witness to the fatal shooting of her unarmed best friend, Khalil, by a police officer. Now what Starr says could destroy her community. It could also get her killed.
Side note: I reviewed this book in 2018 and well, this was really at the start of when I started reviewing books more. I think I probably could’ve said a lot more about this book but I just really sucked at writing reviews back then, which you can obviously tell!
“Sometimes you can do everything right but things will still go wrong. The key is to never stop doing right”
I think this book has shot to the top of my best reads in 2018 and I think it will be one of the books I recommend people read if they ask. I cried countless times and laughed like crazy while reading this. I loved the Carter family and their relationship with each other; I loved that despite the tough situation Starr found herself in, the family could still find reasons to laugh and they continued to live their life doing good and right. I also loved the sense of community that was shared too. It was like a shared commiseration of their situation but still, they didn’t let that get them down.
Honestly, I admit that I found Starr’s attitude a bit childish/petulant at the beginning, I realized that I was expecting her to act like an “adult” and to speak from that “adult perspective”. Once I realized how silly my perception was, and I changed how I viewed her character, I realized that Angie Thomas perfectly captured a young teenage girl who is not only going through the typical “high school drama” but is also trying to navigate her way through the two worlds she straddles, without having to diminish herself in any way. She struggles but she gets there in the end. It was a heart-wrenching, heart-warming journey that I’m glad we got to go on.
“Brave doesn’t mean you’re not scared. It means you go on even though you’re scared.”
This book covers such important issues (prejudice, injustice, racism) that unfortunately haven’t lost traction in today’s “modern world”. It’s disheartening, frustrating and mind-boggling to know that issues people faced decades ago are still an issue today – it’s like humans haven’t progressed and we’ve only regressed. Okay, I’m discounting all the good people in this world, but it’s frustrating to know that people are still so arrogant and so blind to their privilege and that they refuse to acknowledge that they are, indeed, privileged…
Anyway, before I go on a crazy rant about this, I will say that I recommend everyone read this book. I hope people read this and come away with some understanding. Thomas provides a glimmer of light amidst the darkness with this one.
Have you read The Hate U Give? What’d you think of it?
Let me know in the comments and let’s chat!
dinipandareads. 