Evan likes sex.

Or rather, Evan likes sex when it is easy.

He’s got a radar for this kind of thing. He sees the girl he knows will be down for getting down, he gets involved with her, they have sex, and then he moves on to the next one.

Evan can get away with it when he’s away at school. It’s never been a problem before because he’s grown up moving around a lot with his father’s job.

But this time, he meets Collette, and she is a challenge for him. Rather than be turned off by her being a challenge, though, Evan’s into it. And he pursues her because even though she’s playing hard to get, he has it in his head he can get with her. And he does. The real challenge isn’t getting with Collette though. It’s keeping their getting down a secret.

Of course, things can change in an instant. Evan finds this out after a trip to the shower. After having his body beaten by a couple of classmates who didn’t like the little game he plays. Because this time, he picked the wrong girl.

Collette is the ex-girlfriend of his roommate.

That’s where Carrie Mesrobian’s debut Sex & Violence begins. In one chapter, you meet Evan, his desire for sex, then you meet him as he finds himself the victim of violence. Following that introduction, you’re thrown into Evan learning how to reassess his own priorities when it comes to what it is he wants. He’s fearful in a way he’s never been before. What once came easily to him — the ability to seek out a girl and sleep with her consequence-free — is precisely why he’s fearful. The consequences presented themselves in a brutal manner.

Evan’s taken out of school after a stint in the hospital which didn’t heal him of all his physical wounds and certainly didn’t do much for his mental state. Evan and his dad move to a small town in Minnesota on a lake. When he moves, Evan begins therapy for what happened to him. But that therapy can only do so much. It doesn’t remove the overwhelming fear he has of showers. It doesn’t remove the fear he has of establishing a new life.

And even if his therapist insists he needs to make more human connections, convincing himself to do that is not a prospect Evan looks forward to. But he does follow through on one of the therapists suggested exercises, which was to write letters to someone as a means of practicing how to open up and express himself. Those letters he writes are all to Collette — though he won’t send them, it’s a pretty significant choice of a person to whom he chooses to open himself to.

Up until the point when Evan had been a victim of violence, Evan had seen people and things in his life as impermanent. As disposable. That’s why he didn’t get invested in relationships with girls. He simply slept with them when he wanted to. A significant part of this is, of course, because his own father and he moved from place to place. It’s also because his mother’s dead and gone. There’s never been a solid basis for establishing connection and meaning for Evan, and after the incident in the shower, he sees this as even more of a truth.

Evan, too, becomes an object in that moment, rather than a person.

Of course, it would be a really boring story if the entire plot happened in chapter one and Evan put off doing anything to help himself after. Because as much as he learns a lesson almost immediately, there’s a lot more story to be told. Slowly, Evan begins to get to know some of the other kids at the lake, and all of them are partaking in their “last summer” as teens. It’s a chance for them to try the things they never did and to experience life in a way that they don’t think they’ll ever get to again. For these kids, the biggest choice is to practice “non-monogamy” (a phrase which becomes really funny with one of the characters). Evan can be down with this, but it is from a distance.

Enter Baker.

Baker is the first girl who approaches Evan in any meaningful way when he’s resettling in Minnesota. She’s curious about his late-night trips to the lake. He begins opening up to her, little by little, in a way that he’s never opened up to anyone before. In fact, he finds himself sort of falling for her. But again, it’s from a distance. He worries about consequence, even as he begins to hear her story and what it is that she has in her trunk for baggage. She kisses him, and it’s at that point he really begins to worry. Because as much as the kids have said they’re not practicing monogamy this summer, Evan fears that Baker’s boyfriend might not be into the relationship he’s developing with her.

Then they come close to having sex. Baker is the lady in control of their relationship in this moment, and it’s in this scene where Baker becomes my favorite character in the entire story. She’s not a game-player, either. In many ways, she’s a lot like Evan. When he comes to realize that she has the upper hand of power in their relationship, he also realizes how important developing a real relationship with another person is.

And thus, sort of discovers the ties between sex and violence. Both can turn people into objects and both can become means of figuring out that people are just that: people.

Sex & Violence has a lot going on in it besides this. The relationship between Baker and Evan isn’t necessarily the one that means the most to Evan, but it’s an important one in his progression and in his healing process. In fact, there will be more relationships for Evan, and he may in fact find a girl he can develop strong emotional ties to. Moreover, Evan discovers during this summer and subsequent school year that there’s a lot of baggage in his own family that he needs to unpack. It is through learning that other people have their own stories and dirt and crap within them that Evan understands how important those things he carries are what can help him establish something meaningful with other people. That he can’t outrun his own history, but he can instead let it be what it is and use it as necessary in understanding his choices.

As readers, we get this long before Evan does, thanks to his letters to Collette. But Evan doesn’t see it until the very final letter — perhaps the letter that is the most important one in the book and to his story. The circle finally makes sense (this is another little bit in the book, which I haven’t touched on and won’t touch on, but the circle is symbolic and comes together in the end).

Evan is a really complicated and layered character. He’s a teen boy through and through, and the way he approaches his relationships — both those prior to and following the shower attack — ring true. It’s uncomfortable at times to hear his thought process but it’s also true to character. Though the title itself will grab reader attention for sure, there is very little on-page sex and the on-page violence blacks out before become gratuitous. Much discussion of each happens, but in no way will there be anything sexy or bloody that sticks with the reader. Rather, what sticks with the reader is the complexity of either and of both, rendered through Evan and the relationships he does pursue and those which, well, he doesn’t.

There’s a lot to think about in Mesrobian’s book about redemption, as well. Does Evan ever become a character who is healed or better? At what rate is it believable that he can change as a person, and at what rate do we as readers forgive him? I wondered, too, about whether his family backstory aided in the way he understands himself and thus is a means for us as readers to better understand and forgive him, too. In many ways, it’s hugely positive that Evan isn’t healed immediately and that he makes some of the same mistakes he made prior to his being beaten up — even though he’s nervous to pursue sex for sex’s sake after, he doesn’t completely avoid it, either.

None of these questions are a knock on the book. In many ways, they’re what makes the book so memorable for me. I walked away with more questions about character than I did answers. And I also wondered a lot about whether this story would be any different had it been Baker’s story, rather than Evan’s. Would the take aways or perceptions of other characters and readers be different if a girl had been in Evan’s place? Because Evan’s not portrayed as a player here. He’s portrayed as a teen boy who happens to like sex. We accept that at that level. Would the same be true for a girl in that position? Or would more backstory be required or demanded?

The writing in this book is good, though I found at times the pacing wasn’t entirely consistent. At times it dragged a bit — particularly in the middle — and I thought that the ending came about a little bit quickly, particularly when it came to Evan’s new relationship and learning about his girlfriend’s backstory. I wanted to know more because she, too, had a lot of baggage and I wanted to know about how that interplayed with his own. It doesn’t matter in the context of the story (and arguably, it’s better not to know because that’s part of the point, but it left me curious anyway).

Sex & Violence is one to hand off to your fans of contemporary YA books that tackle messy subjects without fear. Evan has a great voice, and the writing — despite tackling a wealth of really hefty subjects — is at times really funny. Because as much as what’s happening is serious, Evan is a teen boy. He doesn’t take it all seriously all the time. He makes jokes. And some of the stuff he does is ridiculous, even if it’s a byproduct of the violence he experienced. He bathes in the lake! He won’t take a shower, even in a safely locked bathroom, but he’ll go take a swim in he lake late at night. It’s strangely funny. I don’t like laying books into categories of “for boys” or “for girls,” but I do think there is a particularly strong appeal in this one for guy readers who feel like contemporary YA is not for them. They’ll see themselves in Evan, even if they have never been in Evan’s place.

I do think this book has the potential to anger readers, particularly adults, who don’t think it’s “realistic.” But I think they’ll be overlooking the fact that teen boys think about these things, both in serious and less-than-serious ways, and they’ll overlook the fact that teen boys are . . . teen boys. While I don’t think this is a perfect read alike to Andrew Smith’s Winger, I think there are some interesting parallels, particularly when it comes to voice and writing and the relationships that develop between teen boys and girls (romantic and not-so romantic), that readers who enjoyed Smith’s novel may want to give Mesrobian’s debut a shot as well.

Sex & Violence is technically available October 1, but my library already has a finished copy ready and in circulation. So it’s also available now kind of. Review copy received from the publisher.