Rage: A Love Story
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4.3 • 39 Ratings
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- $10.99
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- $10.99
Publisher Description
A National Book Award Finalist offers an intense portrait of an abusive relationship.
Johanna is steadfast, patient, reliable; the go-to girl, the one everyone can count on. But always being there for others can’t give Johanna everything she needs—it can’t give her Reeve Hartt.
Reeve is fierce, beautiful, wounded, elusive; a flame that draws Johanna’s fluttering moth. Johanna is determined to get her, against all advice, and to help her, against all reason. But love isn’t always reasonable, right?
In the precarious place where attraction and need collide, a teenager experiences the dark side of a first love, and struggles to find her way into a new light.
PUBLISHERS WEEKLY
Reliable Johanna secretly fantasizes about romantic interludes with wild girl Reeve, but it's only when she agrees to tutor Robbie, Reeve's autistic twin brother, that she actually begins to understand just how troubled her anger-prone crush's life is. Johanna has her own set of problems (her parents are dead, and her relationship with her sister, Tessa, has been strained since Johanna came out), but she is still shocked when she reads Robbie's essay detailing his and Reeve's abusive childhood and by the violence she witnesses outside their shabby home. But as Johanna's romance with Reeve intensifies, so does Reeve's abuse (at a graduation party, she punches Johanna in the face). Reeve's home life may seem extreme especially an act of violence toward the book's end but readers will appreciate Peters's (Luna) incisive handling of such ambitious material. Johanna is a well-crafted character, and readers will understand her motivations, even while wishing she would listen to Tessa, who tells her, "You want to be her savior. But the way she treats you, that isn't love." Ages 14 up.
Customer Reviews
RAGE
It's a great book, but it's very graphic. Wouldn't recommend it to anyone under the age if 15 or if they aren't mature about these kind of things.
Good
Intense and moving story. Not very happy with the ending though.
a beautifully written book.
I think that this book was phenomenal in its story as well as the literature itself. The author did a great job of making each character three-dimensional, neither good nor bad all the time, and making us empathize with both Johanna and with Reeve. The portrayal of abuse and a teen’s need for love is touching. That being said, this book may not be appropriate for kids that aren’t in high school. Part of the beauty of this book is that the characters are so real—this brings some imagery and situations that could potentially be too graphic in one way or another. All in all, it’s a great read, one that I’d recommend in a heartbeat!