The Nickel Boys

The Nickel Boys by Colson Whitehead
My rating: 5 of 5 stars

It surprises me that I would give 5 stars to a novel where the majority of it is about the deprivations of children in a juvenile delinquent home. But Whitehead is able to find that line between exploitation and good story-telling. Life deals all sorts of unfairness, harm, cruelty, small pleasures, great friendships--how does our reactions play a part. Where do we take a stand, and what are the consequences? How do we do the right thing when its not clear what the right thing is? The ending clinches the deal-brilliant! Its a masterpiece. 

  Reassembling those fragments into confirmation of a shared darkness.  If it is true for you, it is true for someone else, and you are no longer alone.

How to tell them that their transgressions against Mr. Marconi were insults to Elwood himself, whether it was a sucker candy or a comic book?  Not because any attack on his brother was an attack on himself, like they said in church, but because for him to do nothing was to undermine his own dignity.

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