I like dark books. It’s not really a secret. For some reason, though, I’m always surprised when I finish a very dark, very gritty book and walk away liking it as much as I did. Especially when there are flaws. That was my experience with Margie Gelbwasser’s Pieces of Us.

Brothers Kyle and Alex and sisters Katie and Julie live in Philadelphia and Cherry Hill, New Jersey, respectively, but every summer, their families get together in upstate New York. Their grandparents were close, and it’s an escape for both of their families and a chance to spend time away from their home lives. Over the course of getting together every year, they’ve forged friendship, but never quite in the way they seem to have this year.

It’s their play place. 

Let me step back though. The story doesn’t begin in the summer. It begins during the school year. All four of the characters have their own story lines, and they tell their personal horrors. Horrors is a nice word, I think, to describe what these characters are dealing with. Alex and Kyle are dealing with the death of their father, who killed himself. Alex, who is the older brother, blames their mother for his father’s death because in his mind, she’s a tramp who pushed his father away. Kyle’s not a happy camper either, but his anger is much more directed toward Alex than toward his father or mother. Alex, for all the anger and resentment he carries about his parents, is no angel. He’s more than willing to use and abuse the girls in his life — he’s not afraid to have sex with them, tease them about being sluts, then let them loose. Alex badgers Kyle to do the same, to let his anger out through sex and dominance, but he has no interest. Kyle’s say means nothing though, as Alex makes him perform a sexual act that not only puts Alex in a role of power, but it furthers Alex’s reputation as a user. More importantly and more painfully, though, he robs Kyle of his innocence.

Life at Katie and Julie’s house is far from ideal, too. Katie has finally achieves popular status in high school. She got it through her role as a lead cheerleader, and she maintains it by acting the way she believes she has to act. She’s got a boyfriend, and he’s one she thinks she has a good relationship with. Except, she doesn’t. Turns out, there’s something more sinister going on and she’s been entangled in a scandal that starts after a night of too much drinking. Of being unable to say no to the advances of another guy because he promised to shatter her reputation if she says one word about what happened. I can’t talk too much more about this particular scene nor what the power struggle becomes because it’s what sets the last half of the story in motion, but it’s disturbing. Katie’s been raped, and not just in the physical sense. Worse is she has to keep her mouth shut about it for fear of losing her status in school, as well as the approval of her mother, who dotes upon Katie because she is a queen bee.

That leaves Julie. Julie’s not popular, and her mother doesn’t care about her. Julie’s pretty much left to fend for herself and she has no chance, living in the shadow of her sister. She’s basically become a forgotten person both in school and to her own mother. There’s also a secondary character worth knowing about in Katie and Julie’s life, and that’s Marissa. She’s one of Katie’s friends, someone who helps her maintain her social status, and she’s engaged in a sexual relationship with a teacher.

When the school year ends and these characters have been put through the ringer, both as abusers and the abused, they return to their summer retreat. The thing about the summer house is that it’s where these teens can leave behind everything going on at home and be themselves. They can wear a different name, a different persona. They don’t have the reputations following them that follow them at school. Except, of course, they can never really escape their baggage. Unlike previous years where they’ve been friends in the summer, things are different now. Things are much more tense. Alex and Katie gravitate toward one another. For almost obvious reasons.

While Kyle and Julie drift toward one another, it’s Julie making slight — and very innocent — gestures toward him. She’s interested in having a relationship, but he’s withdrawing. He’s afraid to, not just because she’s Julie, but because he’s trying to avoid the pressure Alex places on him to be with her. To be with any girl, really. But eventually he breaks and sleeps with Julie. It’s not because he loves her or cares about her. It’s revenge against Alex, and as much as the act empowers him emotionally over Alex, he is rapt with guilt over using Julie for his revenge. In this moment, it’s clear how damaged all of these characters are (it’s obvious before there is damage, but for me, it was this particular scene when it all comes to a head).

This moment is also when there’s a change in Julie. When she earns a bit of her own voice in the story. Now that summer’s ended, the girls go back to their home and the boys to theirs. Things don’t get easier; they become even more complicated as Alex and Katie attempt to maintain a relationship long distance, as do Kyle and Julie. For the first time, it almost looks like there’s something really good going on for Alex with Katie. He may be changing a bit, becoming a more respectful guy. The teens even get together outside of their traditional summer get togethers

But then, Julie makes a mistake that topples Katie from her popular position. That drags out her old baggage. That totally and utterly ruins her. And it doesn’t just ruin her. It ruins what she has with Alex. When they get back together the next summer, Alex seeks his revenge on her in the worst possible way. In a way that literally made me sick to my stomach. In a way that made me realize Alex never did get better. That Katie never got better. That both Kyle and Julie are witnesses, but because both of them are aching themselves, they don’t have the courage to do anything.

If it hasn’t become clear at this point, Pieces of Us is a story about sex and its role in power wielding. It becomes a tool in this story for gaining and advancing, as well as falling and breaking. And the way it’s done is uncomfortable, stomach-turning, and powerful. There’s not a redeemable character in the story, and at the moment when it seems like there’s potential for a character to act, to turn around and stand up for themselves or someone else, they don’t. Rather, they continue to abuse one another and abuse themselves. Gelbwasser is clever in how she approaches the story, and she’s relentless. There are moments when it seems like there’s a possibility a character has a break, but then something comes back to haunt them and sends them stumbling back again. These aren’t likable characters, and it’s debatable whether or not the reader ever particularly cares about their outcomes. But the story is so gripping, so intense and horrific, it’s hard to look away. Even in the moments I needed to stop because I was so uncomfortable, I found myself needing to get back into that world pretty quickly.

One of my favorite parts of the story came through a connection I couldn’t put together until the very end. When the story begins, we learn that one of the first moments these teens bonded together at the summer house came when they met the chicken man as children. He comes every summer to deliver chickens to the families, and they weren’t chickens used for pets. The first summer, Katie and Alex watch the slaughter. But following that summer, Katie had nothing to do with the bloodshed. Instead, it’s where Julie and Alex bond. It’s a metaphor that makes sense when you close the book and one that haunted me through the entire read because I was desperate to know the connection between who watches the slaughter and who shies away.  

I found the writing to be a real weakness in the story. For a long time, it’s difficult to distinguish among the characters since their four voices sound quite similar. It becomes easier as the story progresses, partially because characters become identifiable by their wounds. I found Kyle’s use of second person quite distracting, and despite the fact it makes sense in the context that he’s so far removed from the situations around him (he’s controlled by an outside party), I didn’t think it worked. There were also pacing and passage of time issues throughout, and it was a bit problematic given the length and scope of time the book covered — two school years and two summers.

While the writing was at times problematic, the story kept me going, and the story is what ultimately wins in this case.  This is a risky read, but it is going to appeal to readers who like dark, gritty, intense and uncomfortable reads. Yes, this is a book where teens have sex and where there are really painful sexual moments. There’s no getting around it and it’s integral to the plot. It’s integral to the characters, too, and it isn’t just because they’re experiencing the physical act, but because it is part of their recovery and their understanding of the baggage they carry from other aspects of their lives. As much as this is a bleak book, there is a spot of hope in the end of the story. It’s not resolved and it’s not clean, and had Gelbwasser offered an easy solution at the end, the power would have been lost. But there is a little something redeeming to walk away with, even if the bulk of what’s horrifying and painful about the story lingers long after the book ends.

Review copy received from the publisher. Pieces of Us is available today.