Hate List is a realistically fiction book written by Jennifer Brown. The story mainly takes place at Garvin High School in present day Kansas City, Missouri. The story opens after a tragic school shooting, where six students are killed and several others are wounded. Nick Levil and Valerie Leftman compile a list of people they dislike because those people had somehow irritated them. Nick takes it upon himself to act on that list and kill. Valerie has to deal with the aftermath. The book is viewed from Valerie’s perspective and how she deals with the tragedy with the help of a psychologist, Dr. Heiler. The writing of the book is at times confusing because the author writes about the present then goes back to the day of the shooting, the transitions are not smooth. The characters are not well developed. No character development of Nick is really given other then he was a “nice guy” who one day randomly comes to school and kills his classmates. The theme of this book deals with bullying and the effects it causes. Valerie wrote the hate list to deal with her feelings about people who caused her emotional injuries. I think we all have a “Hate List” even if we don’t write them down. Mental lists of people who we feel have unjustly wronged us. After any tragedy people are always looking for someone to blame. Hate List deals with strong emotions: death, trust, loss, forgiveness, gaining trust, and the need of a community to grieve. Valerie also has to deal with a dysfunctional family unit. All that emotion made the book uncomfortable to read. Bullying causes deep emotional scars that can last a lifetime. Maybe by reading this book, we can watch how we treat other people. Knowing how our words and actions affect other people. Maybe we could step in and help someone when we see them being bullied rather then laughing or ignoring the situation. This book deals with a lot of raw emotions. Healing is also one of those emotions. Valerie helps make a memorial project to help her classmates deal with the tragedy. She apologizes to the people she thinks deserve an apology through those gestures and she began to heal. After her senior year she runs away hoping to start over with a family of her own and not have anybody know about her past. Honestly this book made me feel very upset. The writing style was extremely confusing, because the author depicts Valerie as never knowing what the right thing to do is. She was also very selfish and petty. The story starts off very rough and slow. The author uses flashback writing techniques, which are very confusing, and all the while introducing new characters without developing their background. I personally have not experienced bullying but this book gave me a view of how somebody else works through this tragedy. If the reader was ever bullied then they can be inspired to reach out to someone and talk about what is happening and learn to cope. I personally have methods to deal with anger that Valerie ended up using and didn’t realize they work. I do not understand how Valerie was so oblivious to how everybody acted around her. She was so self-centered and confusing because she wanted to start fights instead of accepting people for being themselves. I would definitely not recommend this book because the writing style was all over the place and most characters were not fully developed. Although the topic is very interesting, the author laid it out in no sequential pattern so it is impossible to read. The author never gave details about what really happened and never told us about what drove Nick to kill, it was all about how Valerie felt with Nick and how she felt with people ignoring her.
The theme of this book deals with bullying and the effects it causes. Valerie wrote the hate list to deal with her feelings about people who caused her emotional injuries. I think we all have a “Hate List” even if we don’t write them down. Mental lists of people who we feel have unjustly wronged us. After any tragedy people are always looking for someone to blame. Hate List deals with strong emotions: death, trust, loss, forgiveness, gaining trust, and the need of a community to grieve. Valerie also has to deal with a dysfunctional family unit. All that emotion made the book uncomfortable to read. Bullying causes deep emotional scars that can last a lifetime. Maybe by reading this book, we can watch how we treat other people. Knowing how our words and actions affect other people. Maybe we could step in and help someone when we see them being bullied rather then laughing or ignoring the situation. This book deals with a lot of raw emotions. Healing is also one of those emotions. Valerie helps make a memorial project to help her classmates deal with the tragedy. She apologizes to the people she thinks deserve an apology through those gestures and she began to heal. After her senior year she runs away hoping to start over with a family of her own and not have anybody know about her past.
Honestly this book made me feel very upset. The writing style was extremely confusing, because the author depicts Valerie as never knowing what the right thing to do is. She was also very selfish and petty. The story starts off very rough and slow. The author uses flashback writing techniques, which are very confusing, and all the while introducing new characters without developing their background. I personally have not experienced bullying but this book gave me a view of how somebody else works through this tragedy. If the reader was ever bullied then they can be inspired to reach out to someone and talk about what is happening and learn to cope. I personally have methods to deal with anger that Valerie ended up using and didn’t realize they work. I do not understand how Valerie was so oblivious to how everybody acted around her. She was so self-centered and confusing because she wanted to start fights instead of accepting people for being themselves. I would definitely not recommend this book because the writing style was all over the place and most characters were not fully developed. Although the topic is very interesting, the author laid it out in no sequential pattern so it is impossible to read. The author never gave details about what really happened and never told us about what drove Nick to kill, it was all about how Valerie felt with Nick and how she felt with people ignoring her.