Speak

Reader reviewed by Erica

This book is amazing. Laurie Halso Anderson does an amazing job illustrating the feelings and hardships the main character, Melinda, is going through. She highlights the fact that teenagers are mean, and all her characters seem so real. There's the appropriate background and depth behind them all. The story also seems to have so much meaning behind it, and get the message out to SPEAK. The book keeps you interested, and you always want more.

Reader reviewed by Ashley

This book is horribly eye opening and amusing.It tells about a girl and her fearful experience with a boy, who winds up going to her school. as she walks throught that halls she hears whispers "thats her, thats the girl that called the cops at the party" She tries to find a safe zone, she finally finds one in her art cxlass. she has lost all her friends and is going through something tramatic. this book was great. read it.

Reader reviewed by tay3196

i really liked this book. it's always kept you on the edge of ur seat. it's about this girl who was abused at a party. The boy keeps coming back to her and bugging her. The book is very good and descriptive. it really focuses on the character and her main problem. The character has a really hard time. this book keeps you on the edge and i really liked it.

Reader reviewed by Katie

This book is an intense read for those of you who have not read it. It is a very powerful book and gives you a day in the life of someone who is truly suffering from a really persol experience like rape. In this book, Melinda is raped at a party and calls the police who crash the party. The following year of high school to say the least is Hell for Melinda. Shes outcasted just for ruining other peoples good time, but what they don't know is that what she had to go through. The emotions pouring from this novel are beyond intense. The is a very powerful message in this book and it caan be interpreted several ways. From Melinda's view, it's ok to get help for something like rape and don't let people tear you down further. From the people looking at her, don't always jump to conclusions about someone because you aren't always going to know just what's going on and sometimes its much worse than you may anticipate. I think this book was very well written and I definitely recommend it. The movie is also pretty good. It stars Twilight's Kristen Stewart.

Reader reviewed by lisa_sps

Warning: This book will make you cry and laugh! Make sure you have a box of tissues and a glass of water next to you while you are reading it!

Spoller Alert

Melinda Sordino (her last name is an Italian Word that means mute or deaf ) starts her freshman year at high school the worst way possible: she has no friends and most of the school hates her because she call the cops at a party where teenagers where drinking!

While the story continues we start to get some inside of Melindas troubled familie, and past! We soon discover that Melinda was rape at the party and she never confessed it making her stop talking!

Melindas, life  is always getting more complicated: she stops talking and doesnt tell anyone one about the attack , her only friend abandoned her, her rapist  is a senior at her high school, all adults in her life (except her art teacher) are mad with her and grounded her because her marks are low,&

But though Melindas life is falling apart her sense of humor (though sometimes a little morbid) never disappears providing the reader with sarcastic comments about her high school life!

  I love this book, is amazingly strong and real and I totally understand Melindas feelings!
The writing is simple and everyone can understand the message that Laurie Halse Anderson is

passing: if something bad happened to you SPEAK UP !

10/10

 

Reader reviewed by Nicki

Melinda Sordino starts high school a few weeks after she was raped at a teen drinking party. She is ostracized by everyone at school because she called the police on their party, but didn't report the rape and is almost entirely mute. The story covers her first year of school. She has emotionally distant parents, a girl she hangs out with who is not really her friend, and a crush on her lab partner. She is getting poor grades in most of her classes due to her emotional trauma, but she has a supportive art teacher. As the year goes on, through her art Melinda is able to come to terms with what happened to her.

Reader reviewed by Bani

This book is so touching. It can be upsetting and unsettling yet very easy and engaging to read. It really makes you feel what it is like to be alone in the world, to be abandoned by the people you call friends because of something that wasn't at all your fault. This can sound like something frustrating to read- but to watch how the character overcomes the trials ahead of her is worth the while.

Reader reviewed by SweetPea

Speak is a very captivating book. Laurie Halse Anderson is a great writer. THe book is about high school cliques and Melinda's struggle to be accepted from her peers. Melinda's sanctuary at school is the art room. Melinda gets raped at a party and she tries to say no but she had beer to drink and cant really get the words out. She calls 911 and a kid takes the phone from her and screams that the cops are coming. It is a must read for everyone! You won't be able to put it down.

Reader reviewed by Dominique

After calling the cops on a big party that results in several arrests, no one will talk to Melinda. Melinda herself barely talks. So why did she call the cops that night at the party? What makes her so silent now?

With no friends at school, Melinda is alone, but she does make a friend, Heather, who later ditches her for another group. Life at school is torture for Melinda every day—her former friends are now her enemies, and even those she didn’t know before hate her. The only person Melinda has at school is her kind art teacher. Through her art, she is starting to open up a little bit, but when will she speak out about what made her call the cops?

But when Melinda’s threat comes for a second visit, things will change in her life—but this time, will it be good or bad? What is the ‘it’ that Melinda fears so much?

Melinda’s feelings were wonderfully expressed and readers are on the edge of their seats as Melinda’s fearful summer is revealed, bit by bit. This book was full of suspense and was a good read!

Reader reviewed by Alexa

Have you ever felt lonely, without a friend in the world? Well, this feeling penetrates Melinda Sordino's life in the novel Speak by Laurie Halse Anderson. In this touching story of a teenage outcast, Melinda has a secret which nobody else must ever find out. However, readers are able to get Melinda's perspective on the situation through diary entries, hence allowing them to discover her secret and see how it affects her in the long run. This secret thus adds mystery to the plot, enhancing the stories moving message. Speak is a great book for girls 12 and older. Its moral is one that will be helpful to know throughout life. The outcast's opinion is seldom heard, yet Mrs. Anderson captures this distinct outlook on life. So, if you want to observe life through the eyes of someone else while experiencing the heart-wrenching reality of assumption, back-stabbing, and desertion, read Speak.