If you love: crime podcasts, gritty YA, crying a lot, K.M. Walton, Ellen Hopkins.
Sadie is a difficult YA story that is quick to devour. With the format of reading a podcast script, it’s easy to compare it to popular crime podcasts like Serial and S Town. Except what those podcasts lack—and what is given in Sadie—is the raw human aspect that only the perspective of those involved in the crime can give. The character of Sadie is one of those missing girls we hear about all the time, lumping a history of a million missing girls into one, shapeless form, but in Sadie we get to follow closely behind her, feel her agony as she gives one last fight.
“I always forget fear is a conquerable thing but I learn it over and over again and that, I guess, is better than never learning it.”
Sadie isn’t particularly smart, or pretty, or anything else that may set her apart from other teens. But. She is tough and stubborn. She grew up in a world of adversity, in poverty and with an absent user mother, but made it her life’s purpose to keep and protect her little sister. Mattie was the crux of every choice Sadie made, and when Mattie is killed, she continues to be the only driving force of the leftovers of Sadie’s life. Sadie’s need for revenge is potent, but it’s like the last fumes of gas before a car’s engine sputters out.
Courtney Summers never shies away from the brutality of what happens to Sadie, but her writing carries the burdensome weight of it appropriately. The abuse isn’t sensationalized, and the tension isn’t contrived. Summers does an excellent job of only revealing a little piece of the puzzle in every chapter, and it keeps you desperately reading on and on.
Something that makes Sadie so compelling is its B characters. We get to meet everyone twice—once through Sadie’s eyes, and a second time through the perspective of the podcast. I love the contrast between how people act in the moment, and how they act as they reflect on what happened. We only get to spend a little time in the web of each side character, but Summers expertly gives them depth.
Without going into too much detail, while I found the ending infuriating, it’s appropriate. Sadie isn’t something to be read and benefitted from. It isn’t here to teach a lesson, or for people to see Sadie’s misfortune and feel grateful for what they have. I read the last page and closed the book, but carried Sadie with me for a long, long time.
Sadie releases on September 4th.
"Sadie" by Courtney Summers; St. Martin's Press; Sept. 2018.
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