The Hate U Give

The Hate U Give by Angie Thomas, 444 pages

Starr attends a mostly white private school but lives in a poor black neighborhood.  One night she goes to a party with one of her friends in the neighborhood.  A fight breaks out involving guns and she quickly leaves with another friend, Khalil.  One the way home they are pulled over and, during the course of the interaction, Khalil is shot and killed by the officer.  Starr, who never really recovered from seeing another friend of hers killed in a drive by a few years before is left reeling from this death.  She wants to help Khalil get justice but she is afraid to speak up because of retaliation and because she is afraid that people will not understand.  This was an amazing book.  The characters are fantastic and very real.  I couldn’t put this book down because I really wanted to know what happened next.  Every teen should read this book.