Bruised Review

TITLE Bruised
AUTHOR Sarah Skilton
PUBLICATION March 5th 2013 by Amulet/Abrams
READ May 11 to 12, 2013
SOURCE Purchased

When Imogen, a sixteen-year-old black belt in Tae Kwon Do, freezes during a holdup at a local diner, the gunman is shot and killed by the police, and she blames herself for his death. Before the shooting, she believed that her black belt made her stronger than everyone else -- more responsible, more capable. But now her sense of self has been challenged and she must rebuild her life, a process that includes redefining her relationship with her family and navigating first love with the boy who was at the diner with her during the shootout. With action, romance, and a complex heroine, Bruised introduces a vibrant new voice to the young adult world -- full of dark humor and hard truths.

I always find stories that deal with a traumatic incident and how it affects the characters minds (and essentially their day to day life) utterly fascinating. BRUISED dealt with just that. After Imogen lives through being one of the few patrons in a diner when it is held up she has blocked much of the event out of her mind. As she struggles with clearing the clouds in her memory of that day and with how mad she is at herself for not doing anything an interesting story unfolds but it left me longing for more of a connection to the characters.

Imogen is a black belt in Tae Kwon Do, her ranking and the fact that she didn’t do anything to take the gunman down during the heist is wreaking havoc inside her. Immediately after the event I really felt for her and I was sad that she was struggling so much with her self confidence. I could understand why she was beating herself up over it after having gotten so far and mastered her colors in TKD. But somewhere along the way her inner turmoil just lost me and I started to feel as if it was a bit grating. This is entirely personal and I know that there are tons of people who disagree with me but I started to kind of glaze over to her emotions. I longed for more to happen outside of her strife and inner dialogue that was essentially beating herself up.

She does make a great connection with Ricky (another survivor of the heist) he was a sweet guy but failed to become more than that. I think there were quite a few missed connections in the story and looking back there was so much potential. Imogen is in a fight with her very best friend and I wanted to get to see them work it out, she is having a hard time accepting her brother’s sleazy ways and I wanted to see them work it out, but there was so much turmoil which led up to some very short resolutions in the end. I think had I gone on more of the ups & downs in these relationships I would have connected to them more, but it was pretty much always down and I never got to experience the peaks. One relationship that I could connect to was between Imogen and her father. As someone who has a father who struggles with overeating greatly affecting his health I could feel the frustrations that she felt when looking at him. I latched onto those moments and was happy that we got to go through more with those two than with the relationships I mentioned previously.

An interesting look at PTSD and how it can affect a teenagers life, BRUISED was a read that kept me entertained for a day and a half but it’s not one that I will be thinking about for a long time to come. I think this is a solid read but I wish I had gotten more out of it. But hey, look at all the glowing reviews on Goodreads, maybe you will get something more out of it than me.