Hate List didn't disappoint me. It didn't exactly wow me either, but that was mostly due to the ending.
I liked the way that the story went back and forth from present day in Valerie's life to the day of the shooting. I also really liked how many of the flashback chapters started with an obituary-like article about one of the victims.
It's easy to see both sides in this story in spite of Valerie being the narrator. While I really do want to sympathize with her (ugh, her parents are so incredibly terrible to her), it's easy to see how she let her venting and moaning get out of hand with Nick. I was actually really surprised to see how little family support she receives throughout her ordeal. Her parents truly do blame her and seem almost to decide that they aren't going to offer her any support. Her brother's character was pretty realistic, I thought. It showed that although the two of them had been close, he had come to resent her for all the attention, both positive and negative, she was receiving as well as for the fact that her actions/inactions had turned his familiar family life upside down.
My biggest disappointment with the book was the ending. It had a very, "... and they all lived happily ever after," feel to it which I just didn't feel was right for a book that was all about revenge, and hurt, and murder. It just didn't seem realistic that all of her peers would come to forgive Valerie for whatever role she played.
All in all, it was a book that kept my interest throughout. Unfortunately it is a very current subject at this point in time. However, with that, I feel that it would interest a lot of the young readers it was intended for.
I liked the way that the story went back and forth from present day in Valerie's life to the day of the shooting. I also really liked how many of the flashback chapters started with an obituary-like article about one of the victims.
It's easy to see both sides in this story in spite of Valerie being the narrator. While I really do want to sympathize with her (ugh, her parents are so incredibly terrible to her), it's easy to see how she let her venting and moaning get out of hand with Nick. I was actually really surprised to see how little family support she receives throughout her ordeal. Her parents truly do blame her and seem almost to decide that they aren't going to offer her any support. Her brother's character was pretty realistic, I thought. It showed that although the two of them had been close, he had come to resent her for all the attention, both positive and negative, she was receiving as well as for the fact that her actions/inactions had turned his familiar family life upside down.
My biggest disappointment with the book was the ending. It had a very, "... and they all lived happily ever after," feel to it which I just didn't feel was right for a book that was all about revenge, and hurt, and murder. It just didn't seem realistic that all of her peers would come to forgive Valerie for whatever role she played.
All in all, it was a book that kept my interest throughout. Unfortunately it is a very current subject at this point in time. However, with that, I feel that it would interest a lot of the young readers it was intended for.