11th January 2008: online review
I have come across a wonderful review here, on the 'Medical Humanities' blog. It is exactly the sort of response I hoped to get from people (particularly non self-harmers) on reading, so many thanks to Ghost Writer for being so nice!
Red Tears by Joanna Kenrick is a stunning novel aimed at teenagers, but worth reading whatever age you are. Kenrick's dramatization of self-harm is shocking; what is most shocking is how ordinary and seemingly common-place it is. Self-harm is not something I have any experience of in any way. I came across the book whilst browsing on Amazon and thought perhaps it was time my teenage daughter read something more challenging and thought provoking than her usual choice of reading material. I thought I'd read it first as it's a pretty heavy subject to foist upon a thirteen year old who, lets face it, has led a rather sheltered life thus far. I needn't have worried, however, as Kenrick's treatment is sensitive, challenging and responsible all at once. As the Red Tears website suggests, its 'a novel of pain, sadness and hope'. As a reader and a parent I found the anguish experienced by the main character quite difficult to shoulder at times. But it is, above all, a hopeful book and I think I understand a little more about what lies behind self-harm than I did before so that's very positive. I didn't realise it is an addictive behaviour. Neither did I appreciate the ideas of control and caring which play out so strongly in self-harming. If readers comments on the website are anything to go by then the book is helpful to those caught up self-harm themselves, even helping some stop which is quite an achievement. It certainly helped my understanding. I don't know what my 13 year old daughter will make of it, but I'll let you know. Red Tears isn't Kenrick's only novel and, from what I can see, she's an author worth supporting, apart from being relevant and a damn good read besides.
22nd July 2007: online interview
I have been interviewed by WriteAway! about RED TEARS and you can read it in full here.
Summer 2007, issue 36 Carousel: The Guide to Children's Books
May 2007 (although published a couple of months earlier): Armadillo magazine
This book is already creating a bit of a stir, largely because of its subject matter. It was published on March 1st, to coincide with National Self-Injury Awareness Day and draws on first-hand accounts of self-harming, though not, as the author points out, her own.
It also uses research published a year ago which says, horrifyingly, that ONE in FIFTEEN young people in
And Joanna Kenrick's book really does help explain why this might be so. The pressures pile up on 15-year-old Emily Bowyer. She is in her CGSE year, a fact which is rubbed in by every teacher in every lesson, and Emily is expected to do well in exams. She expects it of herself, which is part of the problem. But the tipping point comes, as so often with teenage girls, when people she formerly saw as friends, begin to exclude her from their social circle.
It is monstrously unfair. Airhead Lizzie can't be bothered to work and gets Emily to help her write an essay on a book she hasn't read (Emma). Yet later she taunts Emily with being a swot and no fun. Joanna Kenrick depicts the gradual dropping of Emily by the cool group with excruciating exactness. Yes, I know it's been done in the film Mean Girls, but the Lindsay Lohan character wasn't driven to harm herself (regardless of what happened to the actress later).
One of the shocking things is that having a loving and supportive family isn't enough to stop Emily injuring herself. Her parents are terribly worried about younger brother Anthony, who is dyslexic and having a hard time of his own at secondary school. Emily is supposed to get on with her studies and be the one they don't have to fret over.
This is the first novel to look into the mind and motives of a self-harmer and to describe the relief that cutting herself brings. This is her first time: "I draw the blade across the back of my left hand. It leaves a sharp red line, like a cat scratch. It also hurts. And, miraculously, the fog of emotion starts to recede ... My body stops screaming. I stare at the mark on my hand. My pain is real now. I can see it. Others can see it. Therefore, I am not mad."
This is a powerful and timely book, which many teenagers will relate to, even if they haven't been tempted to do what Emily did. And for those who have, there is encouragement and hope which grows organically out of her story.
4th May 2007: Chicklish website (review by Leila Rasheed)
Emily is clever, Emily is strong, Emily can cope. That is what everyone tells her. But this year the pressure is huge - GCSEs, demanding teachers, nagging parents, friends who turn against her in a cruel bullying campaign. Emily has nowhere to turn. She feels as if she is going crazy; no-one seems to believe she is desperately unhappy. The only release she finds comes from cutting herself - with razor-blades, knives, anything she can find. But it has to stay a secret...
Be warned, Red Tears is an upsetting book, but it's a gripping, powerful story and worth a read. If you've ever felt like you're under way too much pressure and no-one is listening, you'll recognise how Emily feels. And if you've ever wondered what would make someone self-harm, this book may help you understand. Not recommended for anyone under 13! The author adds a warning in her book: if you self-harm, be aware you may find parts of the book triggering.
4th May 2007: TES website (review posted on 14th Feb by Jo Klaces)
Emily is studying for her GCSEs. She's reliable and studious, heading for good grades and happy with her family and friends.
But, inch by painful inch, we follow Emily's downward trajectory as her mates abandon her, her parents pressurise and her teachers just simply expect too much. We get to know, in very precise detail, the workings of Emily's racked and introspective brain.
It seems familiar territory, not because the writing is in any way clichéd, it is very far from that, but because it so accurately records the feelings of confusion and worthlessness alchemised with anger and shame that certainly characterised my teen years. It makes the need to self-harm utterly comprehensible, whilst never suggesting that it is a desirable addiction.
Besides being a stand-alone compelling teen read, it is a potential source of positive enlightenment and support for self-harmers, their friends and families.
25th April: Bliss Magazine (June 2007 issue)
19th March 2007: WriteAway! website (reviewed by Stella Muttock) This is an excerpt - to read the whole review (which is very comprehensive), visit www.writeaway.org.uk
Kenrick's skill is to present the many aspects of self-harming behaviour without losing the momentum and structure of a story that is driven by simple dialogue that is sometimes very funny and utterly believable. Although characters are described with economy, they are recognisable and real, and it is through their conversations and Emily's thoughts that events and situations come alive.
Kenrick manages to pack an amazingly wide range of aspects related to self-harming in a readable, punchy story. This book offers support and understanding for young people who have self-harmed and awareness for those who haven't. Emily does receive help through counselling - this part of the story is handled with sensitivity but also hard realism - no easy or magic answers here.
This is a truthful, moving and readable book that offers important information to young people. For parents, teachers and all adults who are concerned with the issue of self-harming it not only raises awareness but also shocks into considering how society needs to promote an environment designed to support and nurture the health, happiness and well-being of its young.
8th March 2007: The Observer (again! But this one is by Rachel Cooke who absolutely HATED it!)
Contrast this with Joanna Kenrick's Red Tears (Faber £6.99). Oh dear, oh dear. A two-page list of worthy acknowledgements before the story has even begun lets you know right off that this is an issue book: in this case, self-harming. There is even a warning to self-harmers that the book may act as a 'trigger'. Emily Bowyer is a clever girl who is about to take her GCSEs. The pressure is getting to her, as are her girlfriends who, for reasons best known to themselves, have decided to stop speaking to her.
At home, she starts by pinching herself to relieve the tension and ends by covering her arms and the tops of her thighs with razorblade cuts. Eventually, her secret is uncovered and she is sent to see a therapist (we never find out if this treatment works). Emily's story isn't badly told, but it is overloaded with serious stuff. As well as the self-harm, there's bullying, exam pressure, a brother with learning difficulties and a fellow pupil she meets on the bus whose brother regularly beats her up. Kenrick's impulse is well-meaning, I'm sure, but whatever happened to the idea of reading as escape?
23rd March 2007: Books for Keeps
I was not looking forward to reading this book. I could not believe that it would be possible for anyone to write a novel for teenagers about cutting and self harm without being macabre and sensationalist. However Kenrick has succeeded in writing a searing novel. Unavoidably there is much detail about the paraphernalia of self harming; the boxes containing razors, the rituals involved, the cuts in flesh and the blood flow and scarring. This is shocking and disturbing. But the strength of the novel lies in the way that all this is nothing compared to the emotional pain of Emily, the main character. Emily is 16 and struggling with GCSEs, changing friendships and changing family relationships. The novel shows brilliantly the way the physical pain of cutting relieves momentarily but can never begin to compare with the emotional despair of a depressed teenage girl - something hard for most adults to grasp.
Emily begins to self harm by pinching herself: 'the pain is good; it helps me focus. It makes the hurtful and confusing feelings go away for a bit', p.80. When this stops working, when Emily the straight grade A student cannot cope with the demands the school and her mother make on her to do well, then she begins to cut. Kenrick captures brilliantly the thinking processes of girls who resort to this concrete and addictive way of dealing with the painful difficulties of teenage existence. Emily's problems with friendship are particularly well described in the book. Nothing can cover over the pain of the 16-year-old who loses her best friend and finds herself with no one to sit with or be with at school.
Equally well done is Emily's relationship with her family; her loving yet demanding and intrusive, mother; her increasingly distant and bewildered father - a subtle portrait of paternal failure - and her lovable younger brother who has learning difficulties and who gets all the attention until Emily fights back in her own self destructive way.
Finally the book includes Emily's sessions with a psychotherapist which begins her process of recovery. These sessions are realistic and illuminating in the demonstration of technique and in the therapist's acceptance of the intractable nature of this symptom. He is aware, as we all must be, that teenage girls who bleed 'Red Tears' will be prone to fall back on this method of dealing with difficulties, all their lives at times of vulnerability and overwhelming pain.
19th March 2007: The Big Issue
14th March 2007: www.lovereading4kids.co.uk (comment by Julia Eccleshare)
Pressure: that's all Emily feels. She's a top student expected to do well at GCSEs, she's a dutiful daughter, doing what her parents expect of her, she's always been a good friend, popular enough with her gang. But when it all becomes too much too handle, Emily finds her own very private relief through self harming. Powerfully written, this is harrowing story of a teenager's struggle to cope with her life.
4th March 2007: Askews Library Service (online review by Hannah Fraser)
This heartbreaking novel for teenagers is difficult to read because of its subject matter - it is told from the point of view of a teenage girl - Emily - who self-harms. To give you a flavour the book opens:
"I open the box. Inside it is softness and steel. Tissues and blades."
This quotation illustrates some of the beautiful, lyrical writing in this novel. Kenrick handles the issue with tact and compassion, offering the reader real insight into the mind of someone who chooses such a seemingly destructive and, to many, abhorrent method as a means to cope. There are many external factors which contribute to Emily's drift into self-harm - factors all seemingly out of her control, factors which overwhelm her and the self-harm is a way to wrestle some of that control back. This is not a preachy book, not an endorsement nor does it provide the reader with a sugary happy-ever-after ending. I found it extremely powerful and very moving.
2nd March 2007: The Oxford Times
27th February 2007: Metro Newspaper
16th February 2007: The Bookseller (May edition)
11th February 2007: The Observer. Review by Stephanie Merritt:
Not for the squeamish, Joanna Kenrick's Red Tears (Faber £ 6.99) is an issue-based novel whose strength lies in its narrative voice rather than in any shock value. Self-harm is an increasing problem among teenage girls and through the character of 15-year-old Emily Bowyer, Kenrick explores what makes a nice, middle-class girl from a loving family slice herself with razor blades: 'I do it because I don't know what else to do.' Research on internet forums has given Kenrick an insider's perspective and the jacket quotes are praise from teenage self-harmers and the psychiatrists who treat them. It's not an easy book to read, but the self-doubt of a girl is sharply rendered.
12th January 2007: LifeSIGNS , a charity dedicated to helping self-harmers and raising awareness of self-harm. Review by Wedge:
I was struck by the accurate portrayal of school life; Emily's friends are the most important thing in her life, and when they drift away from her, it's obvious to the reader that things are going downhill. Emily's parents don't see how important 'one night out' with her friends can be, but by missing out group plans, Emily gets pushed further and further away. The author has captured the pressures of school life very well, Emily's school could be any of our schools, Emily's town could be our town; it's very easy to recognise yourself in Emily's life.
The way in which Emily deals with her own self-injury, and the reaction of her parents, is a sincere attempt to understand self-injury by the author, without going overboard for sympathy. I'm uncertain if Emily's diagnosis of depression is processed correctly, but this book does show how help can be sought from the local hospital and from counsellors. At the end of the day, and in the last chapters of the book, it is Emily who decides how she will handle her self-injurious impulses, and it is Emily who controls herself - just as in real life, we can make changes with the right support and self-belief.
I have to say that a secondary character called Patrice confused me, I was uncertain what her role in the story was; it seems that she has an entire story of her own but separate and distinct to Emily's and so I'm not sure why Patrice is needed in Emily's story. I wonder if Patrice is thrown into the mix to show an alternative side of self-injury, one of physical abuse and copy-cat cutting. I just don't know.
This is a story of the pressures of friendships, the pressures of exams and the complex relationships within a family, all from the personal perspective of fifteen year old Emily. Emily has a unique point of view of how her family life runs, and while the reader may know from experience that Emily is a little paranoid and overly analytical, we also remember that's exactly how we were, not too long ago. Emily slips into relying on pinching and cutting to get her through the day, she finds that hurting herself can stop the emotional turmoil she's in, and gives her the peace she needs to study, and to deal with how upset she is at her friends. Emily knows it can't be good if she's cutting herself, but she doesn't know what else to do, she feels like she's handling herself as best she can, considering the pressures she's under.
The Prologue is triggering. Naturally, there are emotional and physical triggers throughout the story.
5th January 2007:The Oxford Times:
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15th December 2006: The Bookseller. Under 'Bookseller's Choice for March'! (chosen by Sue Steel, of Simply Books in Bramhall, Cheshire):
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