Stop Pretending

BIBLIOGRAPHY
Sones, Sonya. Stop Pretending: what happened when my big sister went crazy. New York: Harper/Collins. 1999.  ISBN 10-0-06-446218-8

SUMMARY
Sonya Sones writes this verse novel based on her own life experiences chronicled in journals she kept as a teen. Cookie, the voice of this story, shares her perspective of family members dealing with mental illness. She speaks of embarrassment, shame, and the pain of losing her sister, her parents and later her friends. In “My Sister’s Christmas Eve Breakdown,” Cookie shares her confusion: One day he was my dad/ so calm and quiet and in control/ the next he was a stranger…/ One day she was my mom/ so reliable and good in a crisis/ the next she was a stranger…That day I sank into the wall/ wondering what these three people were doing in my house… All of the family energy is put into her sister who is institutionalized, leaving Cookie alone at a time in her early teens when she needs them the most. The poems are sad and heartfelt, but offer the reader a sense of empathy and hope as she begins to find new interests and surprising subtle changes in her sister.

CRITICAL ANALYSIS
Sones has crafted a verse novel from the perspective of a 13-year-old girl. The reader discovers a character who, not only struggles with the exceptional case of her sister’s mental illness but with her own self-discovery. The poems are a journey of raw emotion and grief in losing someone very close, someone who does not even recognize her anymore. The poetry is brief and simply written but leaves the reader with unbridled emotion. The poignant impact of “Minus” leaves one with a feeling of deep sadness, compassion and understanding. This morning I’m sitting here taking the test/ but the numbers on the page keep scrambling in my head/ and the only equation I really understand is: 4-1=0.
A change in the mood and tone of the story is evident in “Tired” as Cookie pours out her loneliness and eventually reaches out to someone else to help her cope: I’m tired of this lump in my throat/ and this ache in my chest/ and these knots that gnaw at my stomach…/ I’m tired of having nobody to talk to…/and of crying till my eyes look like I’ve walked into a door/ I’m tired of not believing in God/ or in miracles or in angels…/ I’m tired of being thirteen/ and of not being twelve anymore/ I’m tired of wanting to help my sister and of not being able to help. This is a book of teenage insecurities, coping with unspeakable family issues, making friends, finding new love, anger, grief and hope.

REVIEW EXCERPTS
Starred Review in Booklist “…this novel-in-verse shows the capacity of poetry to record the personal and translate it into the universal.”

School Library Journal: “An unpretentious, accessible book that could provide entry points for a discussion about mental illness-its stigma, its realities and its effect on family members.”

Kirkus Reviews: “Individually the poems appear simple and unremarkable…Collected they take on life and movement, the individual frames of a movie…telling a compelling tale and presenting a painful passage through young adolescence…”

CONNECTIONS
*Other verse novels by Sonya Sones:
what my mother doesn’t know. 2003 ISBN-10: 0689855532
one of those hideous books where the mother dies. 2004 ISBN: 0689858205

*Other verse novels for teens:
Out of the Dust by Karen Hesse. 1997 ISBN-10: 0590371258
Make Lemonade by Virginia Euwer Wolff. 1993 ISBN-10: 0805080708
Keesha’s House by Helen Frost. 2003 ISBN-10: 0374400121
Dead Girls Don’t Write Letters by Gale Giles. 2003 ISBN-10: 0761317279


RESOURCES
http://www.sonyasones.com/spreviews.htm


http://www.sonyasones.com/greatbooks.htm

Vardell, Sylvia. Children’s Literature in Action. Westport, CT: Libraries Unlimited. 2008

Picture: http://www.sonyasones.com/mybooks.htm