"Hate List" The Other Side of Bullying

            I just finished the fantastic novel Hate List by Jennifer Brown. When I first opened this book it reminded me of the shooting at Sandy Hook Elementary in Connecticut. This story was a bit different but similar. I think this is one of my favorite books. At the end it gets really sad. The main character is Valerie and as the author said in her author’s note, it’s about Valerie’s story. This is one powerful novel. It teaches the importance of being nice to people and not bullying anyone.

            Nick is Valerie’s boyfriend in the story. Valerie and Nick are the quiet kids in Garvin High School. They both get bullied all the time. They started a hate list. On this hate list they put all the names of the people that were mean to them or expressed they didn’t like them. Nick kept on giving hints to Valerie about how they could get rid of the people they hated. Valerie didn’t think that Nick was serious.

            One day Christy Bruter (who was on the hate list) broke Valerie’s CD player on the bus. She told Nick the whole thing and he said that he would handle it. She didn’t really get what he meant but when they went inside the school, Nick started shooting. Valerie stopped the shooting and saved Jessica.

            Even though she was the one who stopped the shooting everyone saw her as a threat. People turned away from her and didn’t want to talk to her. No one wanted tot be around her when she went back to school. Even though she also got shot everyone thought she was involved on the plan to shoot people on the hate list. Jessica was the one who started to talk to her. She started to be friends with Valerie. As the book went on, people started to get more and more comfortable around Valerie. Her mom was the one who saw her as a threat. Her mom thought Valerie was a threat to all of the students. At the end Valerie let’s her mom go so that she wouldn’t have to worry about Valerie all the time.

            Bullying was an important part in this book. It teaches that you should always be nice to everyone. You never know, the person you bully might hurt you. You can’t read anyone’s mind. I’m not saying that you shouldn’t trust anyone. I’m trying to say that avoid this by being nice. Bullying someone just might turn around and harm you.