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Original poster

We Need To Talk About Kevin

83 replies

SleepingStandingUp · 20/03/2018 00:48

Just finished it. I called the twist but still thought out was brilliantly done.

So who was really to blame?

OP posts:
TakeMeToTheFresh · 21/03/2018 08:03

Great book and film. It's been a while since I read the book.

I don't really see how Kevin was desperate for his mother's approval. Lord goes on to say otherwise

Ladydepp · 21/03/2018 08:25

I thought it was very powerful and very nuanced. It is one of only a few books that has really stayed with me.

I think Shriver really 'dialled it up' rather like Yanagihara's A Little Life.

To me, Kevin and Eva together created a perfect storm that could not have happened had one of them been a bit different.

I did not get the twist, so I was ShockShock

TakeMeToTheFresh · 21/03/2018 10:20

Ladydepp Would you recommend A Little Life?

IheartCaptainHolt · 21/03/2018 18:35

I agree with PP that it's a book that stays with you.

I think Kevin and his mum were much more alike than she wanted to admit. I think she had s great deal to do with how he turned out.

It is an excellent book though and I recommend it to loads of people

Original poster
SleepingStandingUp · 21/03/2018 19:45

Isit worth seeing the film?

OP posts:
elephanttrunks · 21/03/2018 19:50

I love the book but I don't know if I could watch the film...It would be too much for me

CremeFresh · 21/03/2018 19:56

I thought it was a great book , my sister and I often talk / debate about it. I was reading it on the train and actually gasped out loud when I got to the 'twist' , I really didn't see it coming.

GeorgeTheHippo · 21/03/2018 20:00

I would definitely recommend A Little Life if you liked Kevin.

mamadrummer · 21/03/2018 20:08

I love this book and also loved the film; think the casting was excellent.

I can't remember the twist though?! Is it what he does at the school and to his dad/sister?

I HATE a little life - awful and massively overhyped

Stitchosaurus · 21/03/2018 20:10

I read it before having a child and I strongly felt it was Eva's fault...or at least, she was responsible for emotionally damaging Kevin so badly. I would never re-read it so not sure if I'd feel differently as a parent.

Sevendown · 21/03/2018 20:20

Not read the book but the film has stayed with me.

Creepy.

It reminded me of someone I know.

BonnieBlueButler · 21/03/2018 20:22

I loved ‘Kevin’.

I’ve been a bit afraid of reading ‘A Little Life’ though. Is it as distressing as the reviews suggest. I’m a bit of a wimp these days and anything to do with mistreating kids sets off my anxiety big time.

HumphreyCobblers · 21/03/2018 20:35

I thought it was a very compelling book but that it had absolutely nothing useful to say about the subject matter. Kevin is presented in such unequivocally grim terms, albeit by his mother the unreliable narrator, that the reader is pushed towards absolute hatred towards him, there is no ambiguity about his presentation that would indicate the unreliability of Eva's narration. Celia's character is a caricature of a shy timid child and the dad's complete unquestioning support for his son in the face of overwhelming evidence to the contrary is unconvincing.

Having said all of that, I have read it more than once and really enjoyed it. If enjoy is the right word.

Samewitches · 21/03/2018 21:22

I really enjoyed it, found it unputdownable.
I read it for the first time when I was pregnant with my first baby, I felt bad for the mother. I thought she'd had a wrong'un and that she wanted to love and nurture him but he and his disposition pushed her away, I considered the nature vs nurture debate and thought that perhaps it was Kevin's nature that caused their problems. I read some review of the book online after and heard about the 'unreliable narrator' aspect and really didn't understand it. I was on her side.
BUT- then I re-read it when I was pregnant with my second. So I'd been a mother and had experienced some aspects that I hadn't considered before. Totally different, completely opposite opinion to first time round! She had a baby she didn't want to keep her husband. He was a bit over the top during her pregnancy but she could have stood up to him, she was perfectly capable of doing so. She very probably had PND which I was sympathetic to but I think the author steered it away from that and was successful. She disliked Kevin from the day he was born, everything he did was all about her, he was spiting her. He hated her, he didn't want, like, love her. The first time round I read the father as blind to Kevin's despicable ways, the second he was defending his child as I'd defend mine against someone who was ALWAYS so determined to see the worst in him, blame him, bring him down. I completely got the unreliable narrator thing- I didn't really know why the nannies left, I didn't fully understand the incident where Kevin ruined the mum's office but she was venomous towards him. Pure hatred leapt out at me.
It is genuinely one of my favourite ever books, it really made me think. Unfortunately I'd seen the end of the film before I'd read the book because my DH watched it and I caught the last 10 mins or so so I knew the plot twist all along but I was still shocked at how it happened! Loved it, look forward to reading it again (not whilst pregnant this time, no more kids for me!).

SuperStormborn · 21/03/2018 21:25

Found it hard to get into at the beginning, but became totally immersed a few chapters in. Really well written and utterly shocking in places. Hard to feel compassion for Kevin, and Eva in some circumstances. One of my favourite books.

PrimalLass · 21/03/2018 22:58

Prima do you mean style, quality of writing, believability or just subject matter?

Too long, too detailed, too slow.

Ladydepp · 21/03/2018 23:05

A Little Life is amazing, but harrowing. Not for the sensitive or anxious.

For me these books are written to explore extreme events and possibly to provoke extreme reactions, they are not written as any kind of reality.

Isadora2007 · 21/03/2018 23:11

I Love it.
The film is good but not a patch on the book.
It’s definitely not clear cut whose fault it is- I like the PP suggestion of the perfect storm though- sums up my view.
No baby is born evil.

WORKWORKWORKWORKWORKWORK · 21/03/2018 23:13

OP for further reading, try A Mother’s Reckoning by Sue Klebold, a mother of one of the shooters at columbine.

senua · 21/03/2018 23:27

The major problem that I had with the book was that the family was stinking rich and living in the USA, the epicentre of the therapy world. So why didn't they just get the best intervention that money could buy?

Original poster
SleepingStandingUp · 21/03/2018 23:40

For a gentler look at the story of a highschool shooter (,fictional) try 19 seconds by Jodie Picoult

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CheerfulMuddler · 21/03/2018 23:40

I agree with Samewitches. First time I read it I thought he was a really unrealistic portrayal of a child who was born a devil. What baby doesn't want to breastfeed? What baby hates his mum from day one and cries for hours at a time for no reason?
And then ... Yeah, then I had my own kid. And realised that actually some babies do behave like that, but not because they're evil, just because they're babies with colic or whatever, and because babies are fundamentally selfish and a bit shit at breastfeeding.
It really made me look at Eva in a different way - I had a lot less sympathy for her once I'd had my own child.
I think she absolutely contributed to him turning out the way he did. I think she decided he was evil, and things that another parent would have seen as just him being a difficult baby/child were turned into this grand narrative and eventually he became the person she'd decided he already was. I'm not saying what happened was inevitable, because I'm sure another child would have responded differently, and the father certainly wasn't blameless, but yes, absolutely, she has to take some responsibility.
It's a great book, but not one I'm in any hurry to reread.

Paranormalbouquet · 22/03/2018 08:20

@CheerfulMuddler I also read it pre and post motherhood and had totally different perspectives both times. I had a lot of sympathy for Eva first time around and thought Franklin was a fool.

Afterwards I realised that she was attributing a lot of normal but difficult baby behaviour to malice and obviously never bonded with him. Some terrible combination of nature and nurture.

HopeClearwater · 26/03/2018 23:11

I thought Shriver did a really good job of making the reader swing between the nature and nurture arguments.

The other clever thing she did (apart from the total control of the writing) was to make the weapons of choice something other than guns. That way she took the book away from direct comparisons with eg Columbine, and also deflected away from the gun control/ NRA issues, to concentrate on the relationships and personalities in the family.

Waitingforsherlock · 30/03/2018 19:11

Years since I read it, but I always assumed that Kevin killed Celia and his dad to punish his mum? Particularly to take Celia away from her?

Found the book really disturbing. Agree with PP that it was the combination of the two personalities that created the Kevin who committed the crimes.