You Don’t Know Me by David Klass (2002)
*spoilers to follow…
“You don’t have to see things to know that they are happening.”
Or so says John, the fourteen-year-old protagonist of You Don’t Know Me. He is crying out to his mother (and the others that surround him) to see and to know him as she seemingly does neither. His mother also does not see that her new boyfriend is repeatedly beating John up–leaving shrewdly placed physical marks that only the most observant will notice. Conversely, the marks left on John’s psyche are clearly evident to all who take the time to know him.
John has a lot of “nots” in his life. His mother does not know him, the man in her life is not his father, his school is not a school (it’s an anti-school), his tuba is not a tuba (it’s a frog), his friend who is not his friend, and so on. At one point, his teacher Mrs. Gabriel (aka Mrs. Moonface) asks him, “John, are you thinking? Are the wheels turning?”
Truthfully, John is always thinking and his wheels are always turning. Sometimes he’s thinking about what the Lashasa Palulu would do in a certain situation and sometimes he’s reinterpreting what people are really saying inside his own head; these thoughts are laugh-out-loud funny. But sometimes he’s thinking about how his stepfather is going to hurt him next and the next time could possibly be worse than the last; these thoughts are not the least bit funny. His inner monologue throughout the book is at times humorous and at times horrifying but is at all times painstakingly real.
John’s home situation has colored his perception of others and has created a wall of isolation which he keeps solid with sarcasm and self-assurances that everyone else must be out to make him miserable and to hurt him too. Yet, while John fears not being known, he discovers that he does not know other people either–outward appearances prove often to be deceiving.
The girl of his dreams turns out to be shallow, his mother turns out to be much deeper than he thought, his music teacher turns out to be a hero, his math teacher turns out to have been hurt badly in the past, and the man who is not his father turns out to be a worse criminal than he thought. John begins to let people in and to break down his wall of isolation–through a new friendship with a fellow band member, through his music, and through his slowly rehabilitating relationship with his mother.
Most of the novel is largely comprised of John’s talking about his situation. His horrible treatment at home is largely witnessed through retrospective introspection; so, for some, the violent actions detailed at the end might be sudden and jarring. Yet, this violence is not gratuitous; rather it is a necessary plot device underscoring the horror of John’s situation and of the situation of others’ like him who slip through the cracks “unknown”.
Klass’s story is a reminder to some to be cognizant of the pain of others and to step in before it’s too late and to others (those in John’s situation) that people who want to help are out there, willing and ready to help if asked. You can find additional recently published novels on child abuse at my list at WorldCat.org relating to child abuse.
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