Review by Kay Snell
Orca Book Publishers, August 16, 2022
96 pages, paperback, $10.95 CAD, 9781459834187
Young Adult, Hi-Lo reading
Fiction
“Piggy bothering you?” a voice called from behind me.
I turned. If Denise was the monster queen, her boyfriend was the beast jerk king. Cole cracked his knuckles and grinned. His braces gave him an evil silver smile.
“The name’s Mason,” I said.
“Right, Piggy.” Cole threw his arm around Denise and gave her a kiss on the cheek.
Highschool filmmaker Mason learns the hard way that when you take revenge you had better dig two graves, even when you’re planning on ditching town.
With the help of his best friend Maya, Mason intends on finishing one last horror movie before he moves across Canada. But when his shoot is interrupted by his longtime high school bullies, Denise and Cole, he realizes this could be his chance to go out with a bang. Using footage from the interrupted shoot, Mason creates a humiliating video of Denise and Cole that quickly spreads like wildfire across the school. Unfortunately, Cole and his lackeys find out who made it too soon and Mason has to try and survive until the end of the week.
The majority of the story takes place during a sprint across the city as Mason flees for his safety from Cole’s friends on the rugby team. Unfortunately, the description of the city is lacking in specificity, and while readers know that Mason is moving to Toronto we don’t get to know where he lives now which makes it difficult to imagine anything unique to ground the scene in. However, we do get to see sparks of character from the city through its people in the form of a pushy saleswoman Mason meets while hiding in a local shop, annoyed pedestrians, skaters, and aggressive drunks. These little interactions add to the colour of the story and make the world seem much larger.
But as for Mason’s character, he first comes across as one dimensional. His main focus is filmmaking, but he doesn’t care much about leaving his city and bestfriend, Maya, behind. In fact, Maya doesn’t come up again after the second chapter. However, this may speak more to his desire to escape his bullies rather than abandon his friends. But despite the true hatred Mason feels for both Denise and Cole, there is a moment where Mason has to decide if he’s going to escape while Denise is almost assaulted by aggressive drunks or if he’s going to stand up for her. The conflict Mason feels in this moment I think adds a greater complexity to his character that contributes to his realism as a victim of bullying.
Although Mason doesn’t undergo significant character development, he does learn to let go of revenge and in-doing so a mutual respect arises between Denise and Mason. For readers worried that such a sappy ending will lessen the impact of this revenge novel, worry not: Marty Chan still delivers a satisfying finale and Mason finds a way to leave his former bullies to their just desserts. While I would have liked to read more of Maya’s character, the novel still ends on a valuable note: that forgiveness is possible but not always necessary.
Like the chase scenes, this novel is a fast-paced quick read for Hi-Lo readers that sticks to the action with tidbits of Mason’s thoughts sprinkled in along the way. Overall, the novel is paced well for lovers of revenge and action.
Kay Snell is a Media Studies student at UBC with a passion for creative writing, puppetry and musical theatre in a way that coincidentally overlaps at times. They’re also a sucker for a happy ending.
YOUNG ADULTING 