Speak -- Laurie Halse Anderson

I finally got up the courage to read Speak.

I know that it's wrong for me to have waited so long--it's an important book, one that everyone in this field should read at least once. At least.

It affected me pretty much the way that I thought it would--it threw me for a total loop. I actually read it weeks ago, but I haven't been ready to talk about it until now. Don't get me wrong. I'm not going to get all mega-sensitive and Hunter-esque on you guys. (God, she'd probably be so happy to know that her name has ended up in my vocabulary, even though it's totally not flattering. I hope she isn't reading this. If you are, did you pay Steve back yet? I think that you might owe him some money).

But, regardless of how ironic and funny and good this book is, it's a really, really, really painful one. And an angry one. Especially if you go into it knowing exactly what's going on from the beginning.

Anyway. Hmmm. Apparently I'm not as ready to talk about this one as I thought. Well. I highly recommend it, at any rate.