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Kindness for Weakness

by Shawn Goodman

Kindness under pressure

Regular price $15.24 USD
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AlbakiReads Editorial

Kindness under pressure

Set within a juvenile justice environment shaped by violence, Shawn Goodman’s novel centers on a boy confronting what friendship, brotherhood, and manhood mean when kindness is treated as weakness. The struggle to survive is linked to a more personal challenge: deciding what kind of person to become. Physical and emotional abuse are part of the book’s social landscape, giving its questions about strength and care concrete stakes. The focus on a young person trying to define manhood on his own terms connects the institutional setting to questions of identity and belonging.

Good fit for readers who enjoy

  • Teens and young adults interested in fiction about friendship, brotherhood, and coming of age.
  • Readers seeking young adult fiction that addresses violence and physical or emotional abuse.
  • Readers interested in stories set in the juvenile justice system.

Themes

Kindness and strengthFriendship and brotherhoodComing of age and manhoodViolence and abuseJuvenile justice

Based on publisher information and book metadata.

Book overview

"In the spirit of [Walter Dean Myers's] Monster meeting The Catcher in the Rye, Goodman's masterful story will remain with the reader long after the last page, echoing the raw truth that perhaps a real man is one who is both brave and scared." --Ruta Sepetys, author of Between Shades of Gray

In an environment where kindness equals weakness, how do those who care survive?

Shawn Goodman will capture your heart with this gritty, honest, and moving story about a boy struggling to learn about friendship, brotherhood, and manhood in a society where violence is the answer to every problem.

A Tayshas Reading List Pick
An ALA-YALSA Best Fiction for Young Adults Book

"Shawn Goodman takes us inside the gritty world of our juvenile justice system with the verve of a master storyteller." --Jordan Sonnenblick, author of Drums, Girls & Dangerous Pie

"A gripping story of a boy's climb to manhood on his own terms." --Paul Volponi, author of The Final Four

"The reader will be seized by [the boy's] plight and his determination not only to survive, but to better himself." --Todd Strasser, author of Give a Boy a Gun

"Kindness for Weakness is a daring, dazzling leap into the dark passage that is the journey to manhood." --Paul Griffin, author of The Orange Houses

"Gripping action, gritty dialogue, vivid characters, and palpable tension permeate the brief chapters of James's powerful, honest, compelling narrative." --School Library Journal
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