Such a Pretty Girl by Laura Weiss is definitely going to make its reader’s blood run cold. It tells us about one of the most terrible crimes. This is child molestation. Although the novel is not based on a concrete case, the author says that she processed a lot information and used her own experience. No matter what, it is impossible not to believe Meredith from the very first sentence; one can’t help but sympathize with her.
Meredith is a fifteen-year-old teenager, who leads a life of a grown-up person. According to her mother, it is Meredith, who is responsible for her father’s imprisonment. However, it is not the complete truth. Yes, she was the first to report about it, but she wasn’t the only one he raped. Meredith used to love her dad immensely. When he committed the crime and raped her, she lost her trust in people. One moment she believes that they mean no harm to her and another one she is running for her life to hide in a place, where no one can find her. The biggest tragedy of Meredith is indifference of her mother. Meredith needs the mother, but she turns her back on her daughter. This is enough to make the girl plunge in an ocean of despair. The most remarkable thing about Meredith is her readiness to sacrifice herself. Of course, she doesn’t do it happily, she asks questions, cries and suffers, but still summons enough courage not to run away, not to beg social workers or her influential grandmother for help. She wins her battle. Her father won’t be able to abuse children anymore. Meredith proves to be even more mature than her grown-up mother, for she, unlike Sharon, manages to set her love free.
There is no doubt that Charles, Meredith’s father, is a criminal. He is smart, dangerous, heartless, manipulative and so on, but who is Sharon? Meredith says that she, “doesn’t see what she doesn’t want to see”. Is she a villain too? One hundred percent yes! She is ready to sacrifice her only one daughter in order to play happy family with her dear Charles. She doesn’t want to notice facts, accuses others of lies, it seems that she exists in a different world. One of her biggest crimes is her lies to herself. This proves that she is not mature enough to be a parent, that she is too childish to face reality. Her unwillingness to see the truth could cause even more tragedies than it did before.
Such a Pretty Girl has a happy ending. Unfortunately, we all know how rarely they happen in a real life, but this ending gladdens anyway. Just like many other abused children in this big world, Meredith deserves happiness, deserves to be a careless teenager, deserves to build her life without fears and regrets. What is more, Meredith manages to keep her kind heart and soul in this battle. The novel should be read by every parent. The author doesn’t want to scare them, she wants to remind them how important it is to listen to their children, love them and be there for them.
