A great bit thank you to Miriam at Hachette for sending this wonderful YA novel.
TITLE: Burn
AUTHOR: Suzanne Phillips
GENRE: YA
RATING: 4 Stars
In one word - wow!!! Burn, written by Suzanne Phillips is one of the most timely books I have read in recent years. Although I don't have children in school, I have heard some absolute horror stories about students bullying and being bullied - it has become epidemic in some schools! Of course, living in Montreal - the land of school killings - unfortunately, this subject matter was very close to my heart.
I instantly felt both sadness and horror for our main character who has been targeted by the "Red Coats" as being an easy prey to bully. True to reality, Cameron keeps it all inside - and begins to slowly but surely disintegrates - until he ends up no longer living in the present. As he disassociates more and more, he ends up committing the ultimate act.
Burn is written in a sensitive, but yet realistic voice - truly echoing the pain and horror that everyone involves experiences. The author makes sure to portray all of the sides of Cameron and slowly guides us through his psychotic break. As I mentioned, I felt sorry for him, but I also hated what he did.
It must be very difficult for an author to write this type of book - the main character is far from being a hero or sympathetic - yet, all of the characters and the plot work extremely well together.
I loved this book.
2 comments:
That sounds good. I find books like that difficult to read at times.
Ooooh, this sounds really intense even though it sounds like the ending was far from happy. It's always interesting to see how authors decide to write about such a sensitive topic and how well-developed their characters are, so you cannot help but sympathize with them. Thanks for the review!
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