Speak

Speak, by Laurie Halse Anderson

From her first moment at Merryweather High, Melinda Sordino knows she's an outcast. She busted an end-of-summer party by calling the cops - a major infraction in high school society - so her old friends won't talk to her, and people she doesn't know glare at her. She retreats into her head, where the lies and hypocrises of high school stand in stark relief to her own silence, making her all the more mute. But it's not so comfortable in her head, either - there's something banging around in there that she doesn't want to think about. Try as she might to avoid it, it won't go away, until there is a painful confrontation. Once that happens, she can't be silent - she must speak the truth.

This book has been on my periphery for awhile, but it was still surprising to me that it has a tenth anniversary edition already - ten years ago this should have been exactly the kind of book I was reading. Maybe if I had, it would have had a bigger impact on me, like The Luckiest Girl in the World, which is all kinds of melodramatic and over the top but remains one of my favorite "serious topic" books. Reading Speak for the first time as an adult, long since gotten over any high school scars, there is less of an emotional impact, less forgiveness for mood over technique. In less obtuse terms, I just didn't buy into the plot. Back in the day, that wouldn't have been a problem - books that I connected with as a teen were put into continuous rotation regardless of minor flaws. But reading it for the first time, it niggles at me, and distracts from my enjoyment of it. And there is a lot to be enjoyed from Speak; it is a good book, an excellent book for young teens especially. Speak is about Melinda, and from a character development standpoint, it's an amazing piece of work. I truly believed in (almost) all the characters, as they were written very realistically, and the internal viewpoint style of the book lends itself well to a thoughtful look at Melinda's feelings and struggles. Having a less than perfect memory of my own high school years, I can't argue with the author's depiction here - although from my own perspective, few have managed puberty with the grace and goodwill that I demonstrated time and again in the face of everlasting ridiculousness on the part of other people.

While I am willing to believe in the character and life of Melinda, I am not willing to suspend all my disbelief (and a little bit of disappointment) in the plot she must navigate. It doesn't take a detective to read between the lines of the front cover flap, but in case you are easily startled the rest of this review involves a major ***SPOILER***SPOILER***SPOILER*** (although to be fair, it's only a spoiler if you've been under a rock since your early letter-learning days). The book begins at the beginning of school, maybe a few weeks after Melinda called the cops on a teenage party where she was raped, pissing off all her friends, and this is where my imagination begins to stretch. Since the book never covers this time period, we are left wondering why not a single one of her friends asked her why she called. I find it hard to believe that not one of her friends from who knows how long didn't stick by her, at least until Melinda had the opportunity to drive them away as she does someone else later in the book. It made me question just how valuable these friends are in the first place, if they can't forgive one summer faux pas against the years they knew Melinda. And yes, Anderson does try to make even older readers understand the depths of betrayal of the cop-calling (one student's sibling lost their job, or some such thing) but I think the more natural reaction isn't the flat-out hate that Melinda has to deal with, but more of an insidious lack of trust. I feel like the reactions of the other kids are so overblown that it becomes cartoonish, while a more realistic rendering would have been more powerful - trying to fight outright hate is (true story) easier than fighting smoke, the frustration of trying to prove the negative, that you aren't untrustworthy. The matter of Melinda's age also bugged me - it's such a small detail, but she's a full year younger than she should be as a freshman, which made her younger at the time of the rape, and the moment of reveal is done such that I feel like it's just to manipulate the reader, trying to add shock value, a look-how-awful-because-so-young! moment. The mere fact of the rape is appalling by itself, and even though I am sure Anderson didn't intend the age thing to come off the way it did, well, it did to me.

And while we're on the subject of unnecessary overexaggeration, I would like to get the matter of the rapist off my chest. WHY IS HE PURE EVIL? I mean, yes, of course, he is terrible, because anyone who does that to a girl is terrible, but why is he so dumb as to attempt to do it again after she accuses him and her friends don't even believe her? It is nice to prove Melinda's strength and healing after the course of the book, but how insane was that whole scene? To be fair, I was on the edge of my seat biting my nails just as much as the next person, but even while I was terrified for Melinda, I was thinking, "Oh, come on." Part of the reason for the book's endurance is the realistic treatment of teenagers and rape, and all of a sudden there is a too-perfect opportunity for Melinda to change her future the way she can't change her past, and I just don't buy it. I can't help picturing people who have their own struggles to conquer, reading this book and finding hope, but then being like, "Well, since I didn't get cornered by my rapist again and fight him and win and everyone believes me this time, it's not a good ending." Not only are there other ways to prove your strength besides ass-kicking your former rapist, those are much more common. I guess, in the long run, I would have preferred a book that took the hard way out, the way without a tidy bow, the way that has to accept that even without the opportunity to expose your rapist for the scum he is and prove your own strength and non-victimness, you can live without fear or shame.

So give this to every young girl you know, but give it to them before they grow up and become too cynical to read this books for all of its gifts, and none of its flaws. In short, mamas, don't let your babies grow up to be cowboys.