Sex & Violence

Starred review from August 19, 2013
As the title suggests, debut author Mesrobian takes aim at big topics, but what she’s most interested in is the aftermath. Used to being the new guy, 17-year-old Evan may not be much at making friends, but he’s great at finding “left-of-normal” girls to sleep with. When he gets involved with Colette, who’s been labeled a slut by her ex—Evan’s jockish jerk of a boarding school roommate—things go very wrong. Colette is raped, and Evan is badly beaten, which makes his workaholic father finally pay attention. The two move to a lakeside Minnesota town, where Evan is all but forced to engage with a crew of recent high school graduates, when he’d rather lock himself in his room all summer. As Evan heals physically and mentally, he has ample time to consider the part of himself he calls “Dirtbag Evan” and reevaluate his attitudes toward girls and sex. By focusing on Evan, Mesrobian talks about hookup culture in a way that is character-based, not agenda-driven, and showcases a teenager who grows and changes without becoming unrecognizable or saintly. Ages 14–up.

September 1, 2013

Gr 10 Up-Seventeen-year-old, perpetual "new guy" Evan relocates all too frequently with his unsettled widower father, hence never making any real friends. However, he has no problem scoping out easy girls in whatever town they happen to land. At a boarding school in North Carolina while his father is working overseas, Evan's sexual encounters with the wrong girl, schoolmate Collette, lead to his ruthless battering outside the group showers by two stereotypical big bruisers who also viciously rape Collette. Although Evan's badly scarred body heals, his wounded spirit struggles with post-traumatic stress. Spurred into trying to be a good parent, his father moves them to the family's lake house in rural Minnesota and enlists a helpful therapist. There Evan, at first uncomfortably, connects with a whole new cast of teens who offer friendship, partying, sexual, and even romantic potential; gets a job and a car; and slowly begins to resolve his feelings about the assault against him and Collette by writing therapy-prescribed unmailed letters to her. At the same time, Evan's persistent negative behavior means trouble again, though this time he might finally learn a genuine lesson. Evan is not likable initially, especially in the callous ways he sizes up and uses females, but after his horrifying ordeal he transforms into someone with and for whom readers will eventually sympathize, want to shake into sensibility, and feel hope. Crass, crude, yet accurate language amid a balance of harsh moments and sensitive transitions pepper this disconcerting but extremely well-crafted and thought-provoking story for mature teens.-Diane P. Tuccillo, Poudre River Public Library District, CO

Copyright 2013 School Library Journal, LLC Used with permission.

September 15, 2013
Grades 9-12 The word that comes to mind for this debut is tough. The absence of sentimentality and melodrama in favor of frank dialogue and bruising honesty is a gasp of fresh airor at least air that smells of blood and sweat. After repeated moves with his father, 17-year-old Evan has mastered being the new guy: identify the Girl Who Would Say Yes and have sex with her, posthaste. But he miscalculates and receives a beating so brutal that he loses his spleen and retreats to a small Minnesota town to recuperate. There, he warily integrates into a group of teens while dealing with a new set of trauma-related fears that have turned him into a fucking frozen eunuch. Yes, there's foul language aplenty and lots of (mostly fun, satisfying) sex, and Mesrobian's scuffed-up prose makes it all genuine, even when things get tangential. And this long-windedness affords its own woolly pleasures; mash John Barnes' Tales of the Madman Underground (2009) with Melina Marchetta's Jellicoe Road (2008), douse it with sex and scabs, and stand back. Unevenly weighted, but Mesrobian's potential is sky-high.(Reprinted with permission of Booklist, copyright 2013, American Library Association.)