Punch Like a Girl

February 23, 2015
After being sexually assaulted by her ex-boyfriend, Matt, at a party, 17-year-old Tori keeps the incident a secret, and her pain manifests as anger that she finds difficult to control. She shaves her head, alienates her family and her best friends, and begins to lash out physically. It starts with Tori defending her friend Jamarlo at the mall: she punches a guy who made a homophobic comment about him, after which her parents force her to do community service to avoid potential police charges. Threatening text messages from Matt and his new girlfriend only fuel Tori’s anger, and another fight lands her temporarily in the hospital. The children at the women’s shelter where Tori volunteers help her understand that speaking out can be “another way of fighting back,” a tactic she has to use when one of the children is abducted. While Krossing (The Yo-Yo Prophet) acknowledges the importance of self-defense, the story makes clear that sharing one’s pain is equally important. Tori’s anger is palpable throughout, and her emotional evolution is empowering. Ages 12–up. Agent: Harry Endrulat, Rights Factory.

February 1, 2015
Unable to speak of her assault, a 17-year-old girl begins acting out. Friends and family don't understand why Tori's shaved her head and started fighting. Sure, they know she broke up with Matt, but that's no reason to sock a stranger right in the nose. Tori's got a lot of free time right now: Her hair-trigger rage drives her friends away, and an alleyway fight leaves her too injured for the soccer team. It's almost a good thing her parents are forcing her to do community service, if only to fill the days and distract her from the invasive, frightening text messages from Matt. As a volunteer at a battered women's shelter, Tori bonds with a particularly troubled girl, encouraging the child to reach beyond her own nightmares and rescuing her from a deadly situation. Tori's emergence from trauma is lightly sketched, a shorthand recovery that relies on narrative conventions rather than character development-making for an easy read about a hard topic, which is no bad thing. Unusually, her coming of age requires not that she stop being violent but that she learn to apply violence appropriately. A fast-paced book about healing through helping others, speaking up and physical self-defense. (Fiction. 13-15)

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February 1, 2015

Gr 9 Up-Tori Wyatt shocked her family and friends when she shaved her head in the middle of the night. She tells everyone that she wanted to donate her hair to deflect from the real reason-her need to feel strong and tough after being sexually assaulted by her ex-boyfriend at a party. She gets in an altercation at the mall that further surprises everyone and to avoid arrest, agrees to do community service at a shelter for women and children who are victims of domestic violence. Bonding with one young girl at the shelter, Tori finds her strength in defending others and is then able to talk about what happened to her and start on the path to recovery. The first-person present-tense narration gives a sense of immediacy and pulls readers along with the protagonist as she seeks ways to stop feeling helpless in the aftermath of the assault. While her parents and her best friend recognize the changes in her behavior and attitude, Tori isn't yet able to talk about the cause and readers feel her very realistic emotional withdrawals and outbursts. VERDICT While comparisons to Laurie Halse Anderson's Speak (Farrar, 1999) are inevitable, Tori's journey is her own and will provide another option for encouraging necessary discussions on sexual assault.-Amanda Raklovits, Champaign Public Library, IL

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