Splintering

April 19, 2004
Told in hard-hitting free verse, Corrigan's (You Remind Me of You
) sometimes raw, often gripping novel chronicles the aftereffects of a violent assault on a dysfunctional family. The speakers alternate between the younger but tougher sister, 15-year-old Paulie, and the middle brother, Jeremy. Each is haunted by the crime: the family had gone to comfort the eldest daughter, Mimi, briefly separated from her husband, when a knife-wielding intruder broke into Mimi's house. In retrospect, Paulie is swamped by fear following her heroic defense of their mother and Mimi, and Jeremy by shame after his flight to the basement while their father confronted the attacker. Corrigan does not develop the two characters equally. Whereas Jeremy's issues seem a little simplified and his responses a bit static, Paulie's problems are legion (estrangement from friends; a poor choice of boyfriend and first sexual experience; nightmares; the residual effects of an abusive mother). The poems offer insight into sibling relationships, rivalries and misunderstandings, as the brother and sister each rage against the other, struggle at cross-purposes and find ways to reach each other across the parentally imposed silences and secrets. The author does not demonize the parents, however, and in some of the most thought-provoking verses the children muse about evidence of love they had never noticed before. Although this novel captures several kinds of splintering, its climax imparts hope of a solid healing. Ages 12-up.

July 1, 2004
Gr 9 Up-Still severely traumatized by a terrifying attack on their family while visiting their older sister's home, two teens describe the incident and its aftermath. Through a series of prose poems, Paulie (Paulina) and Jeremy gradually reveal the details of the assault, relating how a crazed drug addict broke into Mimi's apartment and threatened their lives. Many of the poems explore the changing dynamics of the three siblings' relationships with their parents and with one another. The formerly confident, successful Mimi reacts to the assault and to her failed marriage by returning to her parents' home and spending her days lying on the couch; Paulie calls this behavior Mimi's "mutation into an inanimate object." Paulie, 15, struggles with a jumble of confused emotions and secretly spends most nights in her boyfriend's college dorm room. Jeremy, haunted by his cowardice and troubled by his younger sister's relationship, is preoccupied with trying to win the attention of a girl with mysterious scars on her neck. Although the characters' alternating poems are indicated by the use of two different fonts, teens will need to read several pages before the voices and points of view become clear. The narrative is written in stanzas that lack the artfully articulated rhythms usually found in free verse and have instead the feel of prose that has been arbitrarily put into poetic format. The book's structure does not enhance its plot or character development and may discourage readers who might otherwise find the story compelling.-Ginny Gustin, Sonoma County Library System, Santa Rosa, CA

Copyright 2004 School Library Journal, LLC Used with permission.

April 1, 2004
Gr. 9-12. A stranger high on PCP crashes a family gathering, brandishing a machete. Dad's heart gives out while fending off the intruder, who then hacks his way into the bedroom where 15-year-old Paulie is hiding. A scene from a lurid horror novel? Nope. No one dies, for one thing. Corrigan is interested in what happens " after " such a traumatic experience, how "the knots of people someone decided to unravel" knit themselves together again. In the same potent, naturally cadenced poetry that she applied to her own anorexia in " You Remind Me of You " (2002), Corrigan alternates between the viewpoints of fierce 15-year-old Paulie and her reclusive older brother, Jeremy, also present during the attack. Corrigan's poetry captures every nuance of the siblings' relationship, although it proves a somewhat clumsy tool for explaining the family issues that hover in the background, including some hazily described physical abuse. But teens will be drawn to the terrifying premise and the characters' searing intensity. (Reprinted with permission of Booklist, copyright 2004, American Library Association.)