Split, by Swati Avasthi. 47.
A well-written and intense YA novel about domestic violence.
Christian Witherspoon took his scholarship to medical school and fled his controlling father’s violent rages, leaving behind his abused mother and Jace, the little brother who had so far escaped the regular beatings. Years later, 16-year-old Jace shows up at his doorstep with no money, a past he’s desperate to hide away, and a promise from their mother to come after him. Needless to say, it’s not that easy.
Jace’s first-person narrative is fluid and believable, and his counting of the days till his mother will join them-while his past slowly catches up with both him and his brother- gives the novel a great deal of tension. I accidentally left it at someone else’s house soon after beginning it, and was quite frustrated until I could retrieve it, whereupon I finished reading it in a single sitting.
The psychology of violence and its long-term effects is dead-on. Though Jace has mixed feelings about his abusive father, the father is a sadistic monster familiar from many fictional and real-life tales of domestic torture and tyranny. But rather than stop there, Avasthi pushes further into more discomfiting territory. By the end of the novel, it’s impossible not to feel emotionally complicit in the cycle of abuse, or to be so morally certain that you’d instantly abandon an abuser… or even whether that’s always the right thing to do.
This would be a good book to teach in high school - it’s an easy, fast-paced read, but presents some genuinely complex and important issues that should make for lively discussion.
This is an ARC I got from deepad. Click here to find out how, why, and how you may get to read it too..
Not yet available, but you can pre-order it here: Split
Christian Witherspoon took his scholarship to medical school and fled his controlling father’s violent rages, leaving behind his abused mother and Jace, the little brother who had so far escaped the regular beatings. Years later, 16-year-old Jace shows up at his doorstep with no money, a past he’s desperate to hide away, and a promise from their mother to come after him. Needless to say, it’s not that easy.
Jace’s first-person narrative is fluid and believable, and his counting of the days till his mother will join them-while his past slowly catches up with both him and his brother- gives the novel a great deal of tension. I accidentally left it at someone else’s house soon after beginning it, and was quite frustrated until I could retrieve it, whereupon I finished reading it in a single sitting.
The psychology of violence and its long-term effects is dead-on. Though Jace has mixed feelings about his abusive father, the father is a sadistic monster familiar from many fictional and real-life tales of domestic torture and tyranny. But rather than stop there, Avasthi pushes further into more discomfiting territory. By the end of the novel, it’s impossible not to feel emotionally complicit in the cycle of abuse, or to be so morally certain that you’d instantly abandon an abuser… or even whether that’s always the right thing to do.
This would be a good book to teach in high school - it’s an easy, fast-paced read, but presents some genuinely complex and important issues that should make for lively discussion.
This is an ARC I got from deepad. Click here to find out how, why, and how you may get to read it too..
Not yet available, but you can pre-order it here: Split