Book Review: Sleeper

Sleeper by MacKenzie Cadenhead
My rating: 2 of 5 stars

Sleeper follows Sarah a typical high school student who is on the lacrosse team, in the popular crowd, has family struggles...and a sleep disorder that causes her to act out her dreams.

While the premise seemed promising and kind of unique, the characters were unrealistic and the plot seemed to get much weirder after about a third of the way through.

Characters:
-Typical bad girl: NOT a cheerleader (shocker), but are there really girls out there in High School with no morals, whose sole job is to make everyone's life a living hell? And are there really "Queen Bee" girls that somehow have control over everyone?

- Main Character (Sarah): In the beginning, we're supposed to feel sorry for her, as she is bullied to the extreme... And somehow no one gets in trouble for anything until it's way too late (are there any teachers at this school?) Also, she seems desperate for someone's approval right from the beginning, either her "boyfriend's" or her former best friend (the Typical Bad Girl).

-Parents (of all characters): All parents seemed to be typically absent and were mostly just there to cause conflict and move the plot along. Notably, the "boyfriend's" parents were never mentioned as doing anything in the present tense, they were only ever mentioned as having previously done something. Were they even alive still? The world will never know. Also, the main character's mom was made to be a sweet mother who just wanted what's best for her child, yet in the beginning, we're told that she just lets her child go into testing by herself when she's TEN, and meet her new doctor. I don't know why, but that rubbed me the wrong way. My own mother used to go into checkups with me all the way until I was half way through high school, because I thought needles were scary. Seems kind of weird to let a ten year old go into a new study by herself, and not be there for at least the introductions.

Without giving too much away, there were a lot of problematic things mentioned in a positive light (slut-shaming, bullying, drug usage, student-teacher relations, etc.), but if you can get past all of this, the author eventually has the characters question their morals and become (slightly) better people. I think there's a good discussion about ethics hidden in here somewhere, but I think most of the message will be lost after reading the intense bullying by the main character and how most of it is just forgiven because of her difficult past.


Triggers for:
-Emotionally Abusive Relationships
-Physically Abusive Relationships
-Stalking
-Slut-shaming
-Body Shaming
-Drug use: real and made up drugs, regarded in both a negative and positive light

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