Exit, Pursued by A Bear by E.K. Johnston

Title: Exit, Pursued by A Bear

Author: E.K. Johnston

Genre: Realistic Fiction, Young Adult

Rating: 5 out of 5 stars

Summary:

“I love you,” Polly says suddenly when I’m almost to the door.

“I know,” I say.

Hermione Winters has been a flyer. She’s been captain of her cheerleading team. The envied girlfriend and the undisputed queen of her school. Now it’s her last year and those days and those labels are fading fast. In a few months she’ll be a different person. She thinks she’s ready for whatever comes next.

But then someone puts something in her drink at a party, and in an instant she finds herself wearing new labels, ones she never imagined:

Victim. Survivor. That raped girl.

Even though this was never the future she imagined, one essential thing remains unchanged: Hermione can still call herself Polly Olivier’s best friend, and that may be the truest label of all.

Heartbreaking and empowering, Exit, Pursued by a Bear is the story of transcendent friendship in the face of trauma.

“I love you,” I say, because I really, really do.

“I know,” says Polly.

This is the perfect book. And I have a new favorite author.

Before anything though–this is a story about rape. Probably not something everyone will want to read about, but I do hope a lot try reading it.

For some reason, I didn’t think anything would top the beauty that is A Thousand Nights, but this book did. It is so, so wonderful because even though it tells the tale of something horrible, there is so much support for Hermione.

I don’t think I can say anything to express just great this book is. It’s not a typical rape story because the heroine doesn’t end up despairing over life and rebelling and basically making her life more shitty. But the emotions Hermione feels and the ordeals she goes through seemed realistic. (Although, of course, in real life someone would probably be feeling far worse if they were alone :().

I cried while reading the book. When I finished the book, I cried some more. Because I wish everyone had a support system like Hermione did. I wish everyone had an awesome friend like Polly, ready to defend them and shut people up when they say the dumbest, most ignorant things. And I wish people would stop judging rape victims and treat them as VICTIMS, instead of saying shit like they asked for it and making excuses for rapists.

There is so much vileness in this world. But maybe, just maybe, this book will open the eyes of some people and there will be less ignorance and horrible shit in the world.