Book Review-The S Word by Chelsea Pitcher

Hey, Wendy Davis spent 11 hours on her feet speaking to filibuster the anti-abortion law that they wanted to pass making abortion illegal past 20 weeks, regardless of medical complications, and elsewhere both DOMA and Prop 8 got killed. This news made me very happy. 

Title: The S Word

 Author:  Chelsea Pitcher

Series:  N/A

Published:  7 May 2013 by Gallery Books

Length: 304 pages

Warnings: suicide, rape, quite a few issues

Source: netgalley

Summary : First it was SLUT scribbled all over Lizzie Hart’s locker.
But one week after Lizzie kills herself, SUICIDE SLUT replaces it—in Lizzie's looping scrawl.
Lizzie’s reputation is destroyed when she's caught in bed with her best friend’s boyfriend on prom night. With the whole school turned against her, and Angie not speaking to her, Lizzie takes her own life. But someone isn’t letting her go quietly. As graffiti and photocopies of Lizzie’s diary plaster the school, Angie begins a relentless investigation into who, exactly, made Lizzie feel she didn’t deserve to keep living. And while she claims she simply wants to punish Lizzie’s tormentors, Angie's own anguish over abandoning her best friend will drive her deep into the dark, twisted side of Verity High—and she might not be able to pull herself back out.

Review: Lizzie  got Slut written all over her locker. After she kills herself, she gets Suicide Slut written on it-in her own handwriting. Although what started it was Lizzie being caught sleeping with her boyfriend, Angie still is upset at how her best friend has been treated and vows to find out who has been spreading Lizzie’s diary entries around. With drama and mystery at every turn, Angie discovers dark secrets from everywhere at her school.

When I saw the idea of this, I was instantly intrigued.  It’s a really heavy thing to label someone, and there’s a lot of ways it can be taken.

Angie, I liked for some of it. Not all of it. But thinking about how she handles the ending, I kind of respect her for what she does, but also dislike her for the fact that she did what she did that meant she had to do it. Jesse is a character I didn’t really like or dislike majorly. Lizzie is a major character in this, despite her being dead-journal entries really get her across and I think she’s my favourite character.

Chelsea has written the horrors of high school and what teenagers can do to each other via words and actions really well. The social politics of being friends and more and what it all means is evident, and Chelsea doesn’t  make high school seem a nice place to be.

The writing is good. I don’t normally pick out quotes from books that I loved, but one of the best things I’ve read this year is “Monsters are made. We make them, and when we don’t like what we’ve created, we play pretend”.

Really big plot twist! Obviously, I won’t tell you what it is, but it made me see a certain major character in a big way.

Issues such as sexuality and a bit of identity and betrayal and trust  feature quite a bit in this book. I liked it, I think it’s relevant to pretty much everyone,  and the discussion questions at the end are really interesting and I’d love to have a discussion about it at some point.

Overall:  Strength 4 tea to a gritty, real tale that every teen should read.

Links: Amazon | Goodreads | Author website |