Review: Brutally Brilliant
Rating: 5 out of 5
Date: 05 6, 2014
Rarely do I pick up a book and find it virtually impossible to put down, but this one had me up all night.Stories about misfits that somehow manage to band together to battle their tormentors may not be new, but this one is something special. Five students who are inadvertently thrown together in a restaurant during a school field trip meet a very strange man who seems to know just how hellish their school days are. He buys them drinks and stands up to a bully of a teacher who wants him gone. Of course they are enthralled. In that situation, who wouldn't be? And then he invites them to play a game. Their lives will never be the same.One of the things that the author did an incredible job of was making the book go from light to dark. In the beginning the kids find themselves enjoying each other's company. There were several times I actually laughed out loud. As they continue to play the game things start to darken. The group starts to fracture. The story goes from the camaraderie of "us against them" to an "anyone who doesn't agree with me must be stopped" mentality. It's a sad decline they are helpless to stop.This book is a fast paced, dark read. At its core it is a story of the desperate lengths children who are bullied will go to in order to stop their tormentors. Some of the bullies are, no surprise, other students. What might be surprising to some readers is the skewering of the teachers, some who not only turn a blind eye to the abuse but actually partake in it. It was hard to read at times, but as a brutally honest part of the abuse, it both added to the story and went further than most books do when making this subject simply an issue between kids. Overall a lively, harrowing book that is one of the best in this genre that I've read in quite a while.So here I am at three am finishing up my review. Sleep may be overrated, but just the same, I think I will wait until later today before I open his next book. I need a nap.