Book Review: Speak by Laurie Halse Anderson

Book Review: Speak by Laurie Halse Anderson

Quote: I just want to sleep. A coma would be nice. Or amnesia. Anything, just to get rid of this, these thoughts, whispers in my mind. Did he rape my head, too?

The first time I came to learn about the existence of this book happened when I skipped a school day and stayed home and found the cinema adaptation airing on my television. I was thirteen and the protagonist of the story was thirteen. Melinda and I, we just connected. And I fell in love with Kristen Stewart's portrayal, I really wanted to scoop her up, protect her and marry her then.

That was also the first time I really understood the reason for every daughters' mother's fear and concern. I asked my best friend to watch the movie the next day, who soon made an interesting observation about Melinda's ex-best friend Rachelle not being dumb and blinded by love for a boy to forget her reason and thought process. And it taught us one lesson we never forgot: girls must support girls.

I found the book in the school library a few months later, and ever since then, the book has been close to my heart. It taught me about peer pressure, the demand of adolescence to be attractive to the opposite sex and the importance of the word 'NO'. No is a complete sentence. And surprisingly I used the word 'NO' when a classmate made advances a year later.

The significant amount of the book happens in Melinda's mind. After surviving a Rape attack in a high school student party, she goes through depression, loses all her close friends and almost becomes monosyllabic to mute. While her grades drop to Ds and her parents are angry as they are not able to understand what has happened to their once chirpy healthy girl.

This is a book of a survivor, a victim who clung to whatever threads she can to come out of this trauma. Not every victim gets the opportunity or the courage to speak out, Melinda's narrative shifts between observation to sarcasm and internal cry for help. She feels muted and suffocated every passing day of her first year in high school.

Every student, a victim or not, who suffers from an incident or a personal crisis needs a mentor/teacher to just let them be. Mr. Freeman is that soul seeking solace to Melinda's crumbling mind. He gives her the safe space away from prying eyes and something to focus on. This book also taught me the therapeutic role of art! Art might not be the cure but it definitely helps in the healing process Melinda's struggle to draw trees helps regain her voice.

Some of the best quotes come from Mr. Freeman: 'Art without emotion its like chocolate cake without sugar. It makes you gag.', 'When people don't express themselves, they die one piece at a time.'

Melinda finds another safe haven in an old janitor's storeroom where she pastes her art, sleeps and hides from the world. Melinda pastes a poster of Maya
Angelou and she wonders what the poet would advise her. This book is where a teen me met Angelou forthe first time.

This book always make me weep in anger and cry in relief. Speak reminds me the power of friendship, which David provides with his little gestures and Ivy's concern for near mute Melinda. The book taught me to 'Speak Up' against violence and hate, and to support other girls.