Long Way Down
'A masterpiece.' Angie Thomas
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4.6 • 5 Ratings
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- $12.99
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- $12.99
Publisher Description
SHORTLISTED for the CILIP Carnegie Medal, WINNER of the UKLA
'A masterpiece from beginning to end.' Angie Thomas, author of The Hate U Give
AND THEN THERE WERE SHOTS
Everybody
ran,
ducked,
hid, tucked
themselves tight.
Pressed our lips to the
pavement and prayed
the boom, followed by
the buzz of a bullet,
didn't meet us.
After Will's brother is shot in a gang crime, he knows the next steps. Don't cry. Don't snitch. Get revenge. So he gets in the lift with Shawn's gun, determined to follow The Rules. Only when the lift door opens, Buck walks in, Will's friend who died years ago. And Dani, who was shot years before that. As more people from his past arrive, Will has to ask himself if he really knows what he's doing.
This haunting, lyrical, powerful verse novel will blow you away.
'A heartrending and convincing blank verse narrative.'Sunday Times, BOOKS OF THE YEAR
'Astonishing.' Kirkus Reviews
'A tour de force.' Publishers Weekly
'Will attract teenagers who don't consider themselves 'readers'.'The Inis Reading Guide
PUBLISHERS WEEKLY
Will, 15, is following his neighborhood's well-established rules don't cry, don't snitch, but do get revenge "if someone you love/ gets killed" when he leaves his apartment, intent on killing whoever murdered his older brother, Shawn. He's emboldened by the gun tucked into his waistband: "I put my hand behind my back/ felt the imprint/ of the piece, like/ another piece/ of me/ an extra vertebra,/ some more/ backbone." As Will makes his way to the ground floor of his building, the elevator stops to accept passengers, each an important figure from his past, all victims of gun violence. Are these ghosts? Or is it Will's subconscious at work, forcing him to think about what he intends to do and what it will accomplish? The story unfolds in the time it takes for the elevator to descend, and it ends with a two-word question that hits like a punch to the gut. Written entirely in spare verse, this is a tour de force from a writer who continues to demonstrate his skill as an exceptionally perceptive chronicler of what it means to be a black teen in America. Ages 12 up.
