Dear Martin

Dear Martin is a book everyone should read.

The events that unfold in Nic Stone's book are ones that whilst fictional, will undoubtedly chill you to your core. Whilst being eye-opening there is sadly, the acknowledgment that for many people what occurs is a daily occurrence and something that has become a normal part of life.

This indoctrination of racism, of judgment due to the colour of a person's skin is antiquated and shouldn't be a part of twenty-first century living. Nic Stone has created a world that for some is one they recognise all too well and for those like myself, it is unknown and for both parties, terrifying. The main protagonist, Justyce is a teenage boy whose grades have offered him an escape from the world he had grown up in - something that he is all too aware about.

However, when things go wrong and his plan of seeing the world through Reverend Martin Luther King Jr's eyes falls apart. Life truly does kick him down and there were moments in Dear Martin, where I had to stop and wipe tears away as well as control my anger. Then there are moments where I stopped and a feeling of utter devastation hit me and I wished so much I could pull this fictional teenager out of the pages of Dear Martin and hug him so tight to me.

Justyce is forced to see America for what it really is for so many people of colour right from the get-go and you will feel and relate to all of his emotions as everything falls apart from this Prep school student whose initial dream is just to go to Yale.. but instead, to me, his story becomes one of grasping a dream tightly but also having to face harsh and definitely wrong views and impressions of who Justyce is.

This book, I think for many, will change you.. It will awaken a need for equality whose absence this year of cruelty and judgment has been highlighted in a dark and terrifying manner.

Thank you Nic Stone for a story that truly makes you think.