Hate List by Jennifer Brown

Imagine your boyfriend brought a gun to school. Imagined he killed six people and wounded many others. Imagine he hunted them down from a list of people you helped create. Imagine he shot you. Imagine he shot and killed himself in front of you.

That’s what happened to Valerie Leftman during the end of her junior year in high school. Now, after a whole summer of recovery and isolation, Valerie returns to her high school where she must face her guilt and the school’s anger. Although uninvolved with her boyfriend’s gun rampage, Valerie, the rest of her school, and her family can’t help wondering about her role in the tragedy. Before she can bury the ghosts of her memory and the ghosts of the victims, Valerie must finish mourning the boyfriend she loved dearly, must come to terms with her involvement in the massacre, and must begin to see what’s really there.

Hate List is Jennifer Brown’s debut novel and what an extraordinary debut it is. Valerie’s first person narrative is convincing and her emotional turmoil heart-wrenching (I stayed up all night crying as I read the end of the novel). Brown’s treatment of Valerie’s boyfriend is also remarkable—giving us a complex view of him as more than just an enraged, suicidal shooter.

I cannot recommend Hate List highly enough. Although the middle section drags a little, the novel is really astonishingly touching and moving. Valerie’s voice will remain with you for a long time. Readers of realistic fiction will particularly love Hate List, but all readers will find something to like in it. I will be looking out for more of Jennifer Brown’s works in the future.

Brown, Jennifer. Hate List. Oxford Oxfordshire: Oxford University Press, 2009.

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