REVIEW : The Hate U Give

TITLE: The Hate U Give
AUTHOR: Angie Thomas
GENRES: Young Adult, Contemporary, Fiction, Realistic Fiction
PAGES: 438
FORMAT: Paperback
PUBLISHED: April 6th 2017
PUBLISHER: Walker Books

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“What’s the point of having a voice if you’re gonna be silent in those moments you shouldn’t be?”

Sixteen-year-old Starr lives in two worlds: the poor neighbourhood where she was born and raised and her posh high school in the suburbs. The uneasy balance between them is shattered in shooting of her unarmed best friend, Khalil, by a police officer. Now what Starr says could destroy her community. It could also get her killed.

WHAT I THINK

My parents have raised me to fear the police, just to be smart around them. They told me it’s not smart to move while a cop has his back to you.
Khalil does. He comes to his door.
It’s not smart to make a sudden move.
Khalil does. He opens the driver’s door.
“You okay, Starr-“
Pow!
One. Khalil’s body jerks. Blood splatters from his back. He holds on to the door to keep himself upright.
Pow!
Two. Khalil gasps.
Pow!
Three. Khalil looks at me, stunned.

Starr is going home from a party with her best friend Khalil when this police officer pulls them over. But it turns out to be something completely different than a normal check up on Khalil’s license and registration: he gets killed.
From that moment on, Starr is in the middle of an investigation about officer one-fifteen. She’s the only witness who saw that officer murder her unarmed friend who did nothing to deserve to be shot. From there Starr is put up against the decision: to talk or not to talk?

From the moment when I started seeing reviews of THUG this year, I know this is something I need to read. Not because it’s some amazing new YA fantasy but because it’s about something that actually is true, something that actually keeps happening nearly every day. I don’t think this happens here in Finland but I know it happens in America for example. And no, I’m not saying there ain’t racism in Finland, there is, a lot of it. But there is no police shootings.
And racism? It’s something that makes me see red. It makes me so angry every single time I hear about it. And I’m ashamed to admit that I hear the N word too much in my family. But so far I have been able to cut it out from my kids ears and they don’t see people different because of their color or looks. Actually last year when my son started at daycare and there was this black boy at his group (not sure if that’s the right word) he actually told me that “mom now that I cut my hair short, me and this boy look exactly the same! I don’t think our nanny can tell us apart!” I’m completely out of the review now but I was so proud of myself that I have managed to teach them to treat everyone equally and that he doesn’t think they look any different just because their skin color is different. I don’t know if I actually make any sense with my babbling?

But yeah, this novel has a really strong message about racism and the lengths it goes. This is definitely something that I think EVERY SINGLE PERSON should read! Heck, this should be something required to read at school already.

It broke my heart, I cried like a baby a lot. I cried because I was sad and I even cried because sometimes I was so damn angry that we let things like this happen! We should NEVER make assumptions about a person because of their color, nationality or anything else. We should always get to the bottom of things, get to know that person before we make any kind of opinion about them. Not every black people is bad nor is every white people so damn good.

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