The Hate U Give by Angie Thomas (Book + Movie Review)

*spoilers ahead*

Synopsis

To echo every other reader in the universe, The Hate U Give by Angie Thomas is one powerful book. Starr Carter witnesses the shooting of her childhood friend Khalil by a police officer. What happens next shakes her world in more ways than she could have ever imagined. At first she refuses to talk about Khalil’s death, finding it too painful to recount those final fatal moments she shared with him.

Then, people who didn’t even know Khalil start taking advantage of his death, like Starr’s classmates who use it as an excuse to stage a walkout to get out of school. Starr sees the many ways Khalil’s death is being misconstrued without everyone knowing the real story of what happened. Since she is the only eyewitness, she is forced to make a decision whether to speak out or not.

Book Review

This book had me hooked from the very beginning and I tore through it faster than most books I have read lately. The writing paints such a vivid picture of Garden Heights that you are immediately immersed in the story.

One of the things I liked the most about this book was that although the storyline is all too familiar, with each chapter I had no idea what would happen next. The pacing was on point and kept me reading and wanting to know more with each page. I was very impressed with this book and I can’t wait to read Angie Thomas’ next book On the Come Up soon.

Movie Review

I have to say I really enjoyed the movie adaptation of The Hate U Give more than I thought I would. I tried to keep in mind that the book was over four hundred pages so there was bound to be something amiss in the movie, but it was surprisingly a very close comparison.

The biggest differences between the two were that quite a few of the scenes were out of order, and DeVante was completely left out of the movie. These were two very minor things but they are worth mentioning. I knew I would be impressed by Amandla Stenberg’s performance, but I was truly blown away by how well she played Starr. As with the book, I had chills at multiple points throughout the movie.

I would have to give both the book and the movie five stars for telling Starr’s story in such an impactful way that it kept me reading, watching, and utterly moved by the story both times. It has been almost a week since I finished the book and I am still thinking about it, and I know I will be for a while. This book is probably one of the most relevant and timely books I have read in a long time and I would highly recommend it to anyone, youth and adults alike.