Cracked

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More About This Book

Overview

In this gripping debut, a teen takes a bottle of pills and lands in the psych ward with the bully who drove him to attempt suicide.

Victor hates his life. He’s relentlessly bullied at school and his parents constantly ridicule him at home.

Bull is angry. He’s sick of his grandfather’s drunken beatings. And he likes to take out his rage on Victor.

Determined to end it all, Victor takes a bottle of his mother’s sleeping pills—only to be disappointed when he wakes up in the psych ward. And his roommate? None other than Bull, whose loaded-gun effort at self-defense has been labeled as a suicide attempt. Things go from bad to worse—until the boys discover they might just have something in common: a reason to live.

Editorial Reviews

Publishers Weekly
Bullying gets a thorough examination in Walton's YA debut, a stark, but often heavy-handed story that alternates between the perspectives of the victim and the aggressor. Sixteen-year-old Victor Konig may be a math genius, but his icy parents ignore him when they're not pressuring him to be perfect. No longer able to endure parental neglect, as well as bullying at the hands of William "Bull" Mastrick at school, Victor attempts suicide, landing in a psychiatric hospital. Coincidentally, his tormentor ends up there as well, after his own hellish home life drives him to a moment of violence. Committed to the psych ward for five days, the two enemies have to deal with one another, both as roommates and in group therapy. But it may be impossible for them to overcome their respective traumas, abusive backgrounds, and mutual hatred, unless they accept help from outside, unexpected sources. Though Walton successfully exposes the impetus of violence through well-developed central characters, both Victor and Bull's guardians feel one-dimensional. The author's bleak depiction of the cycle of cruelty loses some of its potency through an overly tidy conclusion. Agent: Sarah LaPolla, Curtis Brown. Ages 14-up.
(c) Copyright PWxyz, LLC. All rights reserved.
VOYA
Victor is invisible: ignored by other students at school, continually chastised by his parents, not loved by anyone. The only person who pays attention to Victor is Bull, who terrorizes him. Bull is angry: abused and neglected by his mother, beaten up regularly by his grandfather. Bull is feared by everyone else...until the day that he decides to fight back, using a gun. When Victor and Bull end up in the same hospital, in the same psych ward, in the same room, things get worse. But in a place like that, getting worse is the necessary first step towards getting better. First-person narration alternating between Victor and Bull draws the reader deeply into the story. The fast-moving timeline of recovery seems extremely unrealistic, but the emotional journey of both boys is completely engaging and convincing. Readers who enjoy stories of dysfunction, personal growth, and redemption will love this book. Reviewer: Aarene Storms
More Reviews (1) Fewer Reviews
Kirkus Reviews
In a debut novel utterly devoid of subtlety, a bully and his primary target end up as roommates in a hospital psych ward. Although Bull has tormented Victor ever since elementary school, both come from unhappy homes. Victor is the child of the most exaggeratedly miserable and demanding rich parents imaginable: When he receives a perfect score on only one of three SAT test sections, his mother, unable to eat, asks, "how could you let those other scores happen ... to us?" In Bull's somewhat less caricature-ish family, the grandfather is a violent drunk and the mother spends their food money on beer, but both are protective in their own way. Chapters narrated from each boy's perspective allow readers to see the same situations through both Bull's and Victor's eyes, from an improbable run-in at the Salvation Army to the boys' even more improbable stay in adjacent hospital beds. The hospital is a far more nourishing environment than either teen's home, and readers see both Bull and Victor open up in new ways during their time there. A poem central to the text suggests that mistreated people who feel empty can "fill / themselves / up," but the healing here happens through others' intervention rather than through internal change. Well-meaning but ineffective melodrama. (Fiction. 12-15)

Product Details

  • ISBN-13: 9781442429161
  • Publisher: Simon Pulse
  • Publication date: 1/3/2012
  • Pages: 320
  • Sales rank: 157,024
  • Age range: 14 years
  • Lexile: HL610L (what's this?)
  • Product dimensions: 5.60 (w) x 8.30 (h) x 1.20 (d)

Meet the Author

K. M. Walton is a former middle-school language arts teacher and Cracked is her fiction debut. She lives in Pennsylvania with her family.

Read an Excerpt

Victor

I HAVE WISHED THAT BULL MASTRICK WOULD DIE almost every single day. Not that I would ever have anything to do with his death. I’m not a psychopath or some wacko with collaged pictures of him hanging in my room and a gun collection. I’m the victim.

Bull Mastrick has tortured me since kindergarten. I’m sixteen now, and I understand that he’s an asshole and will always be an asshole. But I wish a rare sickness would suck the life out of him or he’d crash on his stupid BMX bike and just die.

Lately, as in the past two years of high school, he’s been absent a lot. Each day that he’s not in school I secretly wait for the news that he’s died. A sudden tragic death. As in, not-ever-coming-back-to-school-again dead. Then I’d have some peace. I could stop looking over my shoulder every five seconds and possibly even digest my lunch. Bull has a pretty solid track record of being a dick, so death is my only option.

Last year Bull pantsed me in gym. Twice. The first time was—and I can’t believe I’m even allowing myself to think this, but—the first time wasn’t that bad. It was in the locker room and only two other guys saw me in my underwear. And they’re even more untouchable than I am. They’re what everyone calls “bottom rungers.”

Fortunately, the bottom rungers just dropped their eyes and turned away.

But a few weeks later Bull put a little more thought and planning into it. He waited until we were all in the gym, all forty-five of us, and when Coach Schuster ran back to his office to grab his whistle, Bull grabbed my shorts and underwear and shouted, “Yo, look! Is it a boy or a girl?”

I’m not what anyone would categorize as dramatic, but it seriously felt like he grabbed a little of my soul. I remember standing there like a half-naked statue—not breathing or blinking—as wisps of me leaked out of my exposed man parts. I heard a snort, which unfroze me. I slowly bent down, pulled up my underwear and shorts, and walked back into the locker room.

And puked in the corner like a scolded animal.

He got suspended for it, which earned me two guaranteed Bull-free days in a row. You think that would’ve made me feel better. But each time I walked down that hallway in school or thought of the forty-five fellow ninth graders—eighteen of them girls—seeing my balls, I would gag. Then I’d run to the closest bathroom and regurgitate perfectly formed chunks of shame and disgrace.

Bull has a habit of triggering my body functions. In second grade, he made me pee my pants on the playground. He sucker punched me, and I landed face-first in a pile of tiny rocks. Bull squatted down just so he could use my head to push himself back up, squishing the rocks further into my face. He had just enough time to tell everyone I’d peed my pants before the playground monitor wandered over to see what the commotion was.

“Victor pissed his pants! Victor pissed his pants!” Bull shouted over and over again.

I laid facedown for as long as I could. I knew I’d peed my pants. I felt the warm humiliation spread through my tan shorts. And I knew that as soon as I stood up, the difference in color would be a blinking arrow, alerting the entire playground that yes, Victor Konig had just pissed his pants.

I got up on my elbows and felt my cheeks. It was as if my face sucked up those rocks like they were nutrients or something. Many were embedded and had to be popped out by the school nurse. I looked like I had zits—twenty-three red, oozing zits.

My father wanted to know what I had done to provoke “that boy”—like Bull was actually human. My mother only cared about what the adults at the school thought of her eight-year-old son pissing his pants. She said it made her look bad and that grown-ups would think she wasn’t raising me correctly.

“Only weird boys pee their pants on the playground,” she said. And then she asked me if I was weird.

She actually asked me, “Victor, are you one of those weird boys? Are you? You can’t do that to Mommy. I’ve worked very hard to get where I am in this community, to live in this lovely neighborhood and in this beautiful home. I can’t have my only child embarrassing me. Do you understand, Victor? I can’t have you be one of those weird boys.”

I remember apologizing for embarrassing her.

Bull cut in front of me in the lunch line the next day. He shoved me and said, “Out of my way, pee boy.”

I remember apologizing to him, too.

© 2012 K. M. Walton

Customer Reviews

Average Rating 4.5
( 9 )

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Sort by: Showing all of 9 Customer Reviews

  • Posted February 1, 2012

    more from this reviewer

    Highly Recommended

    I LOVED this book. Absolutely loved it! It dealt with suicide and troubled teens, messed up families and pain. It did touch me on a personal level, it did make me cry but it also made me smile and feel hopeful for these two boys. I liked how in the end Walton shows us what has happened and what has changed for Victor and William 4 months after their incidents. It is clear that the psych ward in which they had to spend 5 days proved to be a life-changing experience for them. Also, this book just seemed so real. It was simple an a good way. The characters and situations presented were all realistic and believable. The main characters were extremely likeable and I desperately wanted to hug them and be their friend the whole time. Yes, I even wanted to hug the bully becasue it wasn't his fault he never knew love and violence was all he was ever taught.

    1 out of 1 people found this review helpful.

    Was this review helpful? Yes  NoThank you for your feedback.   Report this reviewThank you, this review has been flagged.

  • Posted January 19, 2012

    Must Read!

    What a great read for teens and parents alike. The best books are those that teach us something or inspire us in some way and this book has surely done that for me. I was engrossed from chapter one! I walked away from this book reminded that I should always be looking for that person who needs a kind word or encouragement. Sometimes it is the smallest gestures that make the biggest impact. The characters are diverse and so well developed. Selfish and brokens characters are starkly contrasted by loving, warm and generous ones. You will follow Victor and Bull as they experience pain and sorrow as well and joy and love.

    1 out of 1 people found this review helpful.

    Was this review helpful? Yes  NoThank you for your feedback.   Report this reviewThank you, this review has been flagged.

  • Anonymous

    Posted May 24, 2012

    Great

    Teaches people not to bully and also what its like.

    Was this review helpful? Yes  NoThank you for your feedback.   Report this reviewThank you, this review has been flagged.

  • Anonymous

    Posted May 5, 2012

    Love

    Such a great book. Really is motivation. Tells everyone that they are worth somthing.

    Was this review helpful? Yes  NoThank you for your feedback.   Report this reviewThank you, this review has been flagged.

  • Anonymous

    Posted March 17, 2012

    Easy Read

    Easy read about two high school boys, one is the bully the other is the victim. They have different and unfortunate home lives, but they end up at the same psych ward in the same room for 5 days.

    Was this review helpful? Yes  NoThank you for your feedback.   Report this reviewThank you, this review has been flagged.

  • Posted March 2, 2012

    It's keeps you captivated from the first sentence!

    “Cracked” by K. M. Walton is the story of two teenage boys who have grown up together. One of them, Bull, has bullied Victor ever since they were small. The book alternates chapters between Bull and Victor. We learn that Bull lives with a drunken grandfather who constantly beats him and a mother who thinks he should have never been born. He takes his anger about his situation on the kids in school, especially Victor. Bull is from the poor side of town; Victor is from the wealthy side. We learn that Victor’s life with his parents is just as abusive, but emotionally and mentally, not physically. Victor decides that the answer to his problems is a handful of sleeping pills; Bull decides his answer to his constant beatings is with a gun. Both boys end up in the psych ward for children who try suicide. Both end up in the same room. The question is: will Bull and Victor be able to understand each other and not kill each other for the five days they are stuck together?

    For a debut novel, K. M. did a masterful job of making the reader feel empathy for both characters. Alternating chapters to tell each character’s point of view shows that you may think you know someone, but you never really do. I think that a poem in the book really sums up what Bull and Victor are feeling:

    Children want to be loved
    Cherished
    Without conditions
    Restrictions
    Limitations
    Or boundaries

    A child’s spirit is a fragile thing
    a hollow egg
    delicate and easy to shatter

    Some wait to be filled
    with direction
    hope

    Someone wait for no one
    they fill
    themselves
    up

    This book is written for young adults and I think that anyone who is a teenager and above would enjoy this book. The author tries to let in the reader as to why some people kids feel that suicide is the answer. They feel alone and that no one understands what they are feeling. Sometimes they just need to know that someone cares. I really enjoyed this book and look forward to reading any more novels that K. M. Walton will write.

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  • Anonymous

    Posted January 11, 2012

    Touching story

    This book was recommended to me by my sister, who knows a family member of the author. I purchased it as the storyline intrigued me but didn't have any major expectations. I didn't expect to finish it in a day but that's what I did. I really enjoyed getting to know the characters and seeing them through their journey. Awesome story...love how it ends.

    Was this review helpful? Yes  NoThank you for your feedback.   Report this reviewThank you, this review has been flagged.

  • Anonymous

    Posted May 22, 2012

    No text was provided for this review.

  • Anonymous

    Posted May 8, 2012

    No text was provided for this review.

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