Expect a full review in the morning (aka in a fee hours). It's way too late right now.

UPDATE:

Alright, let's talk about Kevin (see what I did there?).

I wanted to give this book 5 stars, yep, you bet. I didn't, though. Why? Let's see.

The characters
A lot of people don't like this book because you can't love the main characters. Kevin is a psycho, and downright creepy. Eva is condescending and lacks maternal love. Franklin is a gullible fool. And Celia, she's actually the one character you frequently feel sorry for. So, a bunch of flawed characters that come together and we learn about. That's exactly why I loved them so much. I'm a mother and I didn't feel outraged about Eva not ever wanting kids or not loving her kid once he came around. Kevin was a terrible baby, a scary toddler, conniving child and a calculating teenager. I hated him with every page and I hated Franklin for not believing Eva's accusations. But I loved hating the characters. I loved hating Kevin. I loved hating Eva's manner of speech. It doesn't happen often that you hate characters but devour the book.

The subject matter
Contrary to what you may think, this book is not gory. It deals with a dark and disturbing subject, related to a psychopath (or was he a sociopath?) and yet it's haunting and scary in the perfect way. There are no deep descriptions of the creepy things Kevin does, there's just speculation and that makes it all the more scary. I used to watch horror movies, gory, bloody, guts spilling, blood pouring, those kinds of movies. They were never scary per se. They were gross. They were frightening because of things jumping at you. There are better kinds of scary movies, a scene from The Woman in Black comes to mind. There's a rocking chair rocking back and forth with that creaking sound and all of a sudden it stops in mid shot. Nothing jumps at you. Nothing happens. But that's what makes it frightening. And that's the best way I can describe Kevin. Everything he does, says and alludes to is creepy because it's different in that sense. Even the way he knows his colleagues so well and the way he criticizes some (the Columbine shooters) and praises others (the Hawaii Xerox shooter) is terrifying.

The twist and the ending
I suspected the twist early on. But the way it was revealed was indeed surprising. I can't say much because of spoilers, but man. That scene has stayed with me.

The ending is also appropriate. It's believable. It's a hard situation to be in. I don't know what I would do in Eva's position, but coming from her character, it makes sense that she would, in the end, achieve that kind of acceptance.

The downside
So, if I'm raving so much about this book and how brilliant everything was, why didn't I give it 5 stars? The writing. For the first hundred pages it was hard to push myself to read this book. Getting used to Eva's speech takes a bit of time. It really does sound like the author got a Thesaurus or used the Synonym feature on her writing tool. It's a chore to get through Eva's thoughts, even though in the end it makes sense because it's part of her personality. I told myself that because the book had good reviews I would give myself 100 pages to love it or toss it. I ended up loving it.

One thing that has bugged me is that the whole thing was supposed to have happened on a Thursday (April 8, 1999) and the end scene is the two-year anniversary (April 8, 2001), yet Eva says that it's a Monday. But it's NOT! It's supposed to be a Sunday! That was done in the movie as well (I saw the last scene). It seems to me that error should have been caught by someone. I'm a sucker for exactness.

The bottom line
The story is creepy. It leaves you with a heavy feeling in your heart, but it stays with you and those are the best kinds of books. I recommend it, albeit it has cursing, one specially disturbing scene in the bathroom, and the terrible judging of a drama teacher. So read at your own discretion.

We Need to Talk About Kevin - Likewise Book Reviews

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