Hate List is written by Jennifer Brown. The book starts out in the present and talks about the main character, Valerie, and her journey back to school on the first day of school. Valerie had taken time off from school at the end of the previous year due to a terrible circumstance, then she took time off during summer break. Now that summer break is over, her parents and her therapist are forcing her to go back to school. The event that happened at the end of the last school year still haunts her though. What happened on that fateful day last May was that Valerie’s boyfriend, Nick, brought a gun to school, shot and killed six people, and left many others wounded. The day started out like any other day for Valerie. She woke up, went to school, and met up with Nick before walking in. When they were in the lunchroom, Nick made a beeline for a girl, pulled out his gun, and shot her. Valerie was confused and in shock about what just happened and stood there stunned for a little bit, while Nick continued going …show more content…
(2009) Jennifer was inspired by the real life school shootings that have happened and used the questions she had surrounding them to start her book. She always questioned what happened after school shootings, so she decided to explore the aftermath of them in her book. Jennifer used these questions to build Valerie’s character and take the reader through the journey of Valerie’s healing after the shooting had already taken place. Another recurring problem for Valerie throughout the story was her family. Valerie and her family didn’t have the best relationship and they often struggled to get along. Valerie’s parents had a broken marriage and Valerie had to witness it everyday. Jennifer could relate to Valerie’s situation because her own parents were the inspiration for writing about Valerie’s parents like she did. In Jennifer’s home, her parent’s marriage was broken just like