The Reformatory by Tananarive Due
My rating: 5 of 5 stars

Definitely an uncomfortable, even rage-baiting read. But then, where else should we be in a horror about real life child abuse, institutional-style?

It may have taken place in the 1950's at the height of the Jim Crow era, and the kinds of reform schools for boys, especially black boys, are a well known tragedy just one step to the side from actual slavery, but that doesn't make it any the less resonate with today.

Racism is absolutely rampant and it takes a whole village to create a slave and the slavery mindset.

I can't tell you how happy I was to see some kind of happy ending to this novel.

Ghosts aside, abuse and death aside, I have to say this book was rather soul-killing. I guess that CAN be a mark of a good horror, no? I just wish it wasn't hitting so close to home.



View all my reviews