This book will make you cry. Maybe even in the first paragraph, because that’s where you find out your narrator is a dead little girl, killed violently by her stepfather.
I have two problems with this book; first, the use of the word “buggering” and then the description of the event (made me want to puke, and the fact that a 10 year old girl is telling you the story makes it even worse). Second, the way the concept of forgiveness is crammed in your face in the end. You can’t tell me about the beating this little girl had to endure and then have her blathering on about how you gotta let go, because it wasn’t Ray’s fault, his daddy done mean to him and it made Ray mean, he couldn’t help it, and blah blah blah. Listen to me!! Ray deserved what he got. And you know what? So did the girl’s mom. She failed her daughter, and for that she deserved to be punished. She redeems herself, actually, with what she does to Ray and with how she accepts her end. She sure didn’t pull a Ray and decide it was anyone’s fault but hers, and I liked that.
I liked the book, even though some stuff bothered me. I like books that affect me like this one did, make me feel different emotions: I cried, I got mad, and (lol) the damn thing had me thinking in the little girl’s accent for a few days. I’d put the book down and find myself saying crap like “I need to do them dishes a’fore it gets to late!”
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