Wednesday, August 30, 2017

The Blackbird Season by Kate Moretti

She's different from the other students.  She has almost white hair, wears a Goth look in black clothing, and she really doesn't fit in anywhere.  She tries, half-heartedly, but she gets rejected by everyone she thought was kind.  It's no wonder things worked out like they did.  No one understood her...

Atria Books and Net Galley let me read this book for review (thank you).  It will be published September 26th.

Her family has fallen apart.  Her mother left, then her father left, her brother uses drugs and is abusive, so she stays in the old paper mill.  She has an affinity with blackbirds.  If only she got along better with people.

She does have two teachers who care about her.  One cares about all his students, maybe a little too much.  One is woman who has her class keep journals and she reads them as part of their grade.  The things she reads in the girl's notebook make her wonder what is going on in her head and what the comments mean.

Her grades go down, she starts missing school, and we all know something has happened.  She's been betrayed by her so-called "friends."  Then her friendly teacher refuses to help her.  She was raped by his star player and they taped her saying yes (she was drunk, perhaps fed a roofie and she did say yes, but she meant yes, let me go home) so the teacher takes the stand that she gave him permission.  To get even, she says that the teacher was the one who slept with her.

It's a small town and gossip travels fast.  The whole town implodes from assumptions, suspicions, jealousy, and other emotions.  

It starts as a poor girl tries to make friends and it just keeps worse.  The victim becomes a victim again.  I was hoping for a happier ending but life doesn't always go the way we planned...
 

No comments:

Nonna Marie and the Case of the Lost Treasure by Lorenzo Carcaterra

As Nonna Maria's longtime friend and sometimes colleague, Captain Murino of the Ischian caribineri never wanted to see harm brought to t...