“The Hate U Give” Matters

While Angie Thomas’ novel, “The Hate U Give,” was moderately successful, I strongly believe this is the most underrated book I have had the pleasure of reading so far. A perfect candidate for the banned books list, “The Hate U Give” is an intensely aware novel set out to inform, and possibly inspire, the reader. The voice of the book, Starr, provides an entry way for readers to learn about these issues from the perspective of someone who might be just like them or someone they know. 

Fan art by @helenaw on Pinterest

I myself have a best friend who has lived in a world more like Starr’s, a life of being two different people, a life where she monitored her every word and every action depending on the people she was with so that she wasn’t too “ghetto” at her predominantly white school or too “basic” around people who looked like her. While her life wasn’t full of gangs, drug dealers, and witnessing the murder of her best friends, many are. The reality is that Angie Thomas did not have to try very hard to come up with ideas on how to represent the struggle of being a minority. 

The evolution of meaning behind Tupac’s lyric that “The Hate U Give Little Infants F—s Everybody” is beautifully done to not only show character development, but to guide the reader through the experience of dealing with the confusion of having to figure out who you are from who you’ve been, who you want to be, and who the world sees you as. Now, I fear that any more commentary from me that borders the same line of thought will give me backlash because how can I possibly know what that’s like as a privileged white female? I certainly can’t understand it from reading one book and having a Jamaican best friend. I know that. Which is also how I know how effective “The Hate U Give” is to an audience willing to really listen. 

Angie Thomas has inspired me to write about the issues I want to bring awareness to by the sheer vulnerability and honesty put into “The Hate U Give.” Writers are told to write what we know. I do not know what it is like to grow up in a system designed to make me little just because of the color of my skin. So that’s not what I write. I write characters who don’t know what it is like but witness it and want to change it, because it’s as much their fault as it is the fault of their friends who do experience it. I can write about generational trauma, the mental illnesses that I deal with, the physical disabilities that come with them, and all the things I have tried and been told to try to fix it. 

Fan art by geist-girl on deviantart

I envy Angie Thomas’ ability to write families and conversations that are real and driven. I know for a fact that I struggle to write conversations that contribute to the overall themes of my works because of my lack of real life experience with them. Unlike the relationship between Starr and her father, or even the relationship between her and her uncle, I never had heart-to-hearts with my parents, never had them tell me how it is, never even got to roll my eyes at them telling stories about their youth like they were tales of caution. My coming of age stories fail to have the hero’s journey classic mentor character, whether or not the main character recognizes them as such. 

Angie Thomas surrounded Starr with friends and family that endlessly tried answering her questions as much as they gave her new ones. The best part is that there was no “answer.” At least, not an obvious one that could be boiled down to a single line that wraps up the novel and all its importance in a pretty little bow. Don’t get me wrong, the ending matters (get it?), but just reading the ending is like someone just posting a black square on Instagram because that’s what everyone else is doing. You have to know why they are doing it, and you have to read the whole book to get the ending, at least on a deeper level than you think you get it. I certainly had my eyes opened, and I already thought they were pretty wide. 

If you haven’t read it already, as much praise as the movie has received, I hope you pick up a copy of “The Hate U Give” sometime.