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The Hate U Give cover
RAISE THE FUTURE FEEL THE FISSURE

The Hate U Give

by Angie Thomas

Witness. Target. Survivor.

For you if

you watched something happen and were told that what you saw was the wrong story

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Sixteen-year-old Starr Carter witnesses her childhood friend Khalil shot by a police officer, and then becomes the only witness who can speak about what she saw. Angie Thomas tracks exactly what it costs Starr to stay silent — within her community, within her private school, within herself — and exactly what it costs her to speak. The book has been challenged in school districts for being "anti-police." The police killed an unarmed Black teenager in front of the only person who loved him, and the book is "anti-police." This is the fissure: the gap between what is documented and what power insists is the real story.

Banned & challenged

Find out what they were so afraid of.

Get a copy and decide for yourself.

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They called it 'anti-police.' A police officer shot an unarmed Black teenager, and the only witness who loved him wrote down what she saw — and the book has been challenged in multiple school districts. The real threat isn't the content; it's the documentation. The same jurisdictions removing 'divisive' curricula are the ones pulling the witnesses. The ban doesn't undo the event. It just removes the only account of what the person who was there saw happen.

Where This Book Lives

Themes
bearing witnesscensorshipcoming of agepolice brutalityrace in americaracial injusticevoice and silencing
Topics
black lives matterbook banning in the united statescivil rights movement

Crossover read — works for adults on FEEL THE FISSURE (police violence, witness, the politics of speaking) and for teens on Adolescent Uprising. The "For You If" lands at both registers.

Part of a Reading Journey

censorshipFeatured

Banned: Proof the Books Worked

They're banned because they worked. Read them anyway.

8 books • SEE THROUGH IT → MAKE SOMETHING BETTER

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