Twisted - Laurie Halse Anderson

Ali Mark
Dec 9, 2015
2 min read

Tyler decides to graffiti his school as a prank, which puts him on probation, which leads to him volunteering with the janitors at school. He then bulks up, and starts dating the popular girl in school (as the unpopular boy). Somehow, one party, one nude picture, 47 pitches, 10 bullets, one gun, and one baseball bat later, everything is fine with the world. (It didn't make sense to me either.)

Goodreads readers ranked this book a 4.02 and I'd recommend it if you're into:

a diary like narrative
random video game discussion
very basic writing

This is by far the worst book I've read in several years. Sadly, I have no "positives" for this book. It was simply horrible and if a "0-star" existed, I might still only choose a 1-star for the simple fact that writing a novel takes a lot of effort, hard-work, and energy. I've chosen to only "con" the most noteble features. (Note: there are spoilers under the cons, the last paragraph)

Pros: none.

Cons: the book starts with a warning label (not kidding) that says not for children, but the language was so basic, and the descriptive nature of the book was so basic, that it seemed much like a children's book; the plot in general makes no sense (see below); the entire book just feels like a diary entry that doesn't connect, but because it's a diary from a single person, it's meant to make sense.

SPOILERS:

The story line is unknown to me - I originally thought it might be an underdog story, but in summary: Tyler gets arrested and is on parole for graffiti. Tyler volunteers with the school janitors and because of that, bulks up and becomes attractive to the popular girl in school, Bethany, and they begin dating. They go to a party at which Bethany gets drunk and someone takes a nude photo of her and posts it on the internet. The police investigate Tyler. Somehow, we end up with him wanting to run away, which leads to him contemplating suicide, which (all in the same evening) ends up with him going to the batting cages, then disposing of the bullets, breaking down the gun and disposing of it in the same lake as the bullets. The final step of this strange breakdown is that Tyler breaks his dad's model town with a baseball bat and tells his dad that he ruined his life. Tyler spends the night at his best friend's house and the next morning, all is forgiven between them and they live happily ever after (I think... the end of the book is the accomplishment that Tyler beat some video game he's been playing the entire book.)