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Dredging up the past can knock the present right off balance.
The world expects perfection from seventeen-year-old Shawna Gallagher, and for the most part, that’s what they get. She dates the right boys, gets good grades, and follows her father’s every rule. But when her estranged lesbian mother dies, it’s more than perfect Shawna can take. Suddenly, anger from being abandoned ten years ago is resurfacing along with Shawna’s embarrassment over her mother’s other family. As she confronts family secrets and questions from the past, Shawna realizes there’s a difference between doing the perfect thing and doing the right thing.
Shawna’s honest and relatable voice will draw readers in and hold them until the last page in this coming-of-age story. Jeannine Garsee has delivered a compulsively readable second novel, perfect for fans of Sarah Dessen and Laurie Halse Anderson.
Garsee's (Before, After, and Somebody in Between) second novel hits the ground running and doesn't let up. Shawna Gallagher, a high school senior trying to live up to her domineering father's expectations, is awakened one night by a phone call: her estranged mother, who left Shawna and her father years earlier for a woman, Fran, has had a stroke. Following her mother's death, Shawna must confront her feelings about her mother and her own prejudices (she has particular issues with gay people, which are further complicated when her best friend comes out). Shawna's father, learning that one of Fran's sons is in fact his child by Shawna's mother, fights for (and gains) custody of the boy-finally spurring Shawna to defy him. The novel overflows with story lines and plot twists-Shawna's romance with her stepbrother (and her father's with her former babysitter), her ailing grandfather and the ridicule she faces in school. Nevertheless, Garsee presents a compelling portrait of a young woman growing up and coping with an overwhelming array of problems. Ages 14-up. (Mar.)
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Roy Corson
reviewed Say the Word on May 14, 2012 Say the Word
This book was probably one of my greatest reads of the year. The thing about it is, you are a product of your environment. Whether you embrace it, as Shawna did in the beginning, or tell it to go to hell and forge your own path despite your environment. Either way it influences you.
Shawna's mother left her and her father when she was very young. Not only that, but she left both of them for another woman. As if her own mother seemingly abandoning her wasn't enough she had to listen to her father's venomous attitude against homosexuality. It was no wonder that Shawna was not only homophobic, but also bigoted. It was basically what she had known. I have never felt sorry for someone who displayed such blatant ignorance as Shawna. She let her bitterness and anger towards her mother feed into her father's toxic opinions.
Shawna's father was a piece of work. I genuinely have never disliked a character in a book more than I disliked this man. He was condescending, rude, overbearing, and cruel. I realize that the divorce probably changed him more than anyone realized other than Shawna. He made me really really thankful for my parents.
I think my favorite character came in the form of Shawna's mother's partner Fran's oldest son. He never let Shawna get away with the bull that tended to spew out of her mouth. He made her think, he helped change her mind. I wish there had been more of them than there was, but once again this was not a story of love...at least not the romantic kind. This was a story about family, the ties that really bind, and discovering who you really are along with what you believe.
I really applaud Jeannine Grace for getting me so enthralled in this book. Yes, the book offended me a lot with it's many stereotypes and slurs against the LGBT community, BUT watching someone overcome their intolerance to become someone I know many people would be proud to know? that transformation was definitely worth it.
There's also a really great twist in the book. It killed me when I found it out and what followed had me in tears.
It's great book. Heavy subject matter is included and it is NOT a light read, but on a overcast day when you just want a book to make you think and feel while you're cuddled up in your bed? This is your read.
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