Stop Pretending: What Happened When My Big Sister Went Crazy

Sones, Sonya. Stop Pretending: What Happened When My Big Sister Went Crazy. New York: HarperCollins, 1999.

It was Christmas Eve when her big sister went crazy and now Cookie (as she is referred to) is dealing with the fallout of her older siblings’ sickness. Cookie’s father and mother are fighting with more frequency and her sister’s empty bed is a constant reminder that her sister is no longer herself. She is hesitant to tell her friends about what has happened, because she is afraid of how they will react. When she does let them know they act concerned; then it is revealed that they are making fun of her and her sister, passing notes about what Cookie had told them in confidence. Cookie has a great dislike of visiting her sister in the asylum where she is staying and is confused by her sister inability to get better. Eventually, Cookie figures out there is a new normal in her life. She makes a new friend, finds a boyfriend and her home life with her parents begins to stabilize. While things will never be like they were, things can get better from what they were at the beginning.

In her first verse novel, Sones creates a world in which poetry comes to the forefront easily and logically. Using poetry in a linear format, she relates the story of a girl dealing with the mental breakdown of her sister (which is based on the author’s own experiences). The poems differ in length, format, rhythm, tone and sound. All of these elements help to increase the forward movement of the reader as they follow along with the story, giving them little pause to become bored or uninterested. What is most striking is the emotion conveyed throughout the work; the reader feels the complex emotions that Cookie deals with in the poems. From uncertainty about how her friend will treat her once they know the truth about her sister (“If I told them that my sister’s nuts/they might act sympathetic/but behind my back/would everyone laugh?”) to her fears about ending up like her sister (“If I stay/any longer/than an hour/I’ll see that my eyes/have turned into her eyes”), Cookie’s voice and emotions are the focus of the work. The reader gets the voice of the character through the poems, not just words and phrases. It does seem, however, that taken out of the context of the collection, the poems may be difficult to understand.

In a verse novel, the idea of organization is of utmost importance, as each poem leads to another conclusion or enlightment. The way that the poems are put together in the work is done is such a way that the reader can immediately engage and follow the story. Kirkus Reviews notes the power of the collected poems, stating, “[i]ndividually, the poems appear simple and unremarkable…[c]ollected, they take on life and movement, the individual frames of a movie that in the unspooling become animated, telling a compelling tale.” The topic of the novel is made clear through the tone and style of the poems and the language used supports the work. It truly feels as if a teen is relating their issues to the reader, not as if it is forced by the author for a work.

Book jacket found on: http://www.galaxy.bedfordshire.gov.uk/cgi-bin/vlib.sh?enqtype=RLIST&rlist=45&doc=doctype.teen