Long Way Down

Long Way Down
by Jason Reynolds

From the publisher:
"A cannon. A strap.
A piece. A biscuit.
A burner. A heater.
A chopper. A gat.
A hammer
A tool
for RULE

Or, you can call it a gun. That’s what fifteen-year-old Will has shoved in the back waistband of his jeans. See, his brother Shawn was just murdered. And Will knows the rules. No crying. No snitching. Revenge. That’s where Will’s now heading, with that gun shoved in the back waistband of his jeans, the gun that was his brother’s gun. He gets on the elevator, seventh floor, stoked. He knows who he’s after. Or does he?

As the elevator stops on the sixth floor, on comes Buck. Buck, Will finds out, is who gave Shawn the gun before Will took the gun. Buck tells Will to check that the gun is even loaded. And that’s when Will sees that one bullet is missing. And the only one who could have fired Shawn’s gun was Shawn. Huh. Will didn’t know that Shawn had ever actually used his gun. Bigger huh. BUCK IS DEAD. But Buck’s in the elevator?

Just as Will’s trying to think this through, the door to the next floor opens. A teenage girl gets on, waves away the smoke from Dead Buck’s cigarette. Will doesn’t know her, but she knew him. Knew. When they were eight. And stray bullets had cut through the playground, and Will had tried to cover her, but she was hit anyway, and so what she wants to know, on that fifth floor elevator stop, is, what if Will, Will with the gun shoved in the back waistband of his jeans, MISSES.

And so it goes, the whole long way down, as the elevator stops on each floor, and at each stop someone connected to his brother gets on to give Will a piece to a bigger story than the one he thinks he knows. A story that might never know an END…if WILL gets off that elevator. 

This is a very unique read for me for a couple of reasons. A. I don't like novels in verse. I find them very disjointed and choppy and I miss all the little details. B. I don't tend to read urban/inner-city/gang type books as they are (thankfully) so far out of my scope of experience. However, I read this one because I wanted to make sure of the content before talking it up to any of my students. Once started it is very hard to put down. Luckily reading about 67 seconds on an elevator only takes about an hour of your time. The choppiness of the verse fits the story, and the layout adds to the plot as well. This book will go through my 8th grade boys like wildfire. But what will it teach them? That is the problem I have with this book. The dead people Will sees on the elevator seem too happy to see each other and there is a lot of camaraderie between them all. What would a grieving 15 year old take from that? He's feeling lost, alone and scared. Too me it seems like it would convince him that he wants to be with those dead people. That is just my opinion, and I know most other reviewers (and I'm sure the Newbery Committee) disagree with me. It was gripping, it was real, but did it really get the point across and did it glorify violence just a little bit too much for me? Will teenagers get the subtext that "The Rules" are stupid, or will they just see all of the characters' complete adherence to them? I'm not sure. 

Areas of concern:
*There is quite a bit of cussing, but not as much as I was expecting. The "f" word appears once with a handful of all of the other cuss words. I don't remember any profanity.
*The book begins with a young person getting shot and killed and many other murders are discussed.
*There is talk of dealing drugs and stealing.
*The main character is planning on a revenge shooting.
*A complete lack of role models of any kind. 

Suggested Ages:

Publisher's Weekly - Ages 12+

School Library Journal - Grades 8+