Books › The Hate U Give
The Hate U Give
531 pages
An urgent, heart-wrenching journey of a teenager finding her voice and demanding justice in a fractured world.
What it feels like
Reading this book feels like stepping directly into the shoes of someone navigating two entirely different worlds, only to have them violently collide. The narrative is propulsive and deeply urgent, driven by a conversational, authentic voice that makes the heartbreak feel intensely personal. Despite the heavy, dread-soaked atmosphere of systemic injustice and grief, the story is profoundly anchored by the warmth of family and the fierce resilience of community. It is a galvanizing experience that pulls you through paralyzing fear into a space of righteous, empowered anger. This is a must-read for anyone who craves a deeply empathetic, character-driven story that balances the devastating weight of real-world trauma with the triumphant, hard-won discovery of one's own voice.
- Mood
- tense
- heart-wrenching
- galvanizing
- warm
- Tone
- earnest
- impassioned
- conversational
- resilient
- Pace
- propulsive
- Themes
- finding one's voice · the burden of code-switching · systemic injustice · community resilience · grief and trauma
- The writing
- Direct, conversational, and deeply grounded in an authentic, relatable teenage voice.
- The arc
- Moves from paralyzing shock and fractured identity to righteous anger and empowered, vocal activism.
- Who it's for
- Readers seeking a deeply empathetic, character-driven story that tackles urgent social issues with both heartbreak and hope.
Content notes
- police brutality
- gun violence
- racism
- grief
- strong language
About the book
The Hate U Give is a 2017 young adult novel by Angie Thomas. It is Thomas's debut novel, expanded from a short story she wrote in college in reaction to the police shooting of Oscar Grant. The book is narrated by Starr Carter, a 16-year-old black girl from a poor neighborhood who attends an elite private school in a predominantly white, affluent part of the city. Starr becomes entangled in a national news story after she witnesses a white police officer shoot and kill her childhood friend, Khalil. She speaks up about the shooting in increasingly public ways, and social tensions culminate in a riot after a grand jury decides not to indict the police officer for the shooting.
The Hate U Give was published on February 28, 2017, by HarperCollins imprint Balzer + Bray, which had won a bidding war for the rights to the novel. The book was a commercial success, debuting at number one on The New York Times young adult best-seller list, where it remained for 50 weeks. It won several awards and received critical praise for Thomas's writing and timely subject matter. In writing the novel, Thomas attempted to expand readers' understanding of the Black Lives Matter movement as well as difficulties faced by black Americans who employ code switching. These themes, as well as the vulgar language, attracted some controversy and caused the book to be one of the most challenged books of 2017 and 2018 according to the American Library Association.
Description from Open Library.
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