For young adults grappling with the aftermath of trauma and the complexities of truth, this novel explores how public narratives can be manipulated and how survivors reclaim their stories.
A parent might reach for this book when their teen is navigating the aftermath of a traumatic event and struggling with how personal truth can be distorted by public perception. Three years after a school shooting, survivor Lele is determined to correct the heroic, but false, narrative that has been built around her deceased friend, Sarah. Lele and the other survivors band together to reclaim their own stories, even if it means confronting their community's need for a simple hero. The book directly addresses grief, PTSD, honesty, and the immense pressure of media narratives. Due to its mature theme of a school shooting, it is best for older teens (14+). It’s a powerful choice for opening conversations about complex truths and the courage it takes to speak them.
A school shooting is described in multiple flashbacks. The focus is on emotional impact, not gore.
Sensitive Topics
The book's central topic is the aftermath of a school shooting. The approach is direct and emotionally raw, focusing on PTSD, survivor's guilt, and long-term grief. It is a secular perspective that directly challenges a religious narrative that has co-opted the tragedy. The resolution is not neat but is ultimately hopeful. The survivors find solace and strength in their shared truth, but the public narrative isn't completely undone, reflecting a realistic outcome. Healing is presented as an ongoing process.
Ideal Reader
A mature teen (15+) who is grappling with how stories are told and mis-told in the media and online. It's for the reader who feels their own experiences have been misunderstood or oversimplified by others, or who is interested in social justice, activism, and the complexities of truth and memory, especially in the context of tragedy.
Parent Prep
Parents must know this book deals directly with a school shooting, with flashbacks detailing the event. The emotional content is intense and sustained. It should be given with context, especially to a teen who has personal experience with violence or trauma. A pre-reading conversation about how media shapes narratives around tragic events would be very helpful. A parent hears their teen expressing frustration over how a community or national tragedy is being portrayed in the news or on social media. The teen might say something like, "That’s not the whole story," or, "Why is everyone only focusing on this one part of it?"
Age Experience
A younger teen (14-15) will likely connect with the friendship dynamics, the central mystery of what really happened, and Lele's personal journey. An older teen (16-18) will be better equipped to analyze the sophisticated commentary on media ethics, public grief, religious appropriation of tragedy, and the long-term psychological impacts of trauma.
What Makes It Special
Unlike many books that focus on the day of a school shooting, this novel's unique power comes from its focus on the years after. Its central conflict is the battle over the *narrative* of the event. It's a sharp, insightful critique of how society processes, simplifies, and mythologizes tragedy, making it a compelling book about the act of storytelling itself.
Read plot summary
Three years after surviving a school shooting, Lele is haunted by the public mythologizing of her friend Sarah's death. The accepted story, that Sarah died defending her Christian faith, is a lie. Frustrated by the simplistic and inaccurate narrative that has erased the real, messy experiences of the other survivors, Lele and the five others decide to come together to tell their individual, true stories of what happened that day. The book follows their journey of confronting their trauma, their complicated feelings about Sarah, and the public backlash they face for challenging a beloved story.
This overview was generated by AI based on the book's content and reviews, and may not capture every nuance.
Discussion Prompts
1
Lele knows telling the truth about Sarah will hurt Sarah's family and the community. Do you think she made the right choice? Is there ever a time when a comforting lie is better than a painful truth?
2
Denny, the shooter's brother, is also a survivor whose story is ignored by the public. Why do you think the community preferred the heroic story about Sarah over the more complicated stories of survivors like Denny or Miles?
3
Each survivor remembers parts of the shooting differently. How does the book explore the idea that memory is subjective, especially after trauma? Did it change how you think about eyewitness accounts?
4
Before they decide to speak out, the survivors are isolated in their grief. How does the act of coming together and sharing their stories help them begin to heal?
