Another Tiffany D. Jackson book. This means that it’s another interesting story. I previously reviewed The Weight of Blood. Refer to this post if you’re interested in my thoughts.

The Weight of Blood by Tiffany D. Jackson: Maddy Did It

Honestly, it’s hard to come up with something to say after reading a Tiffany D. Jackson story. I don’t have the research to properly talk about everything explored in the books I’ve read from them, but I hope to give this book the justice it deserves with this review. It should be read by as many people as possible.

Synopsis

Enchanted gets the opportunity for her dream to be a singer to come true with the help of Korey Fields, but nothing is what it seems. Behind closed doors, Korey is abusive and controlling. Things get worse when she wakes up with blood on her hands and he is dead beside her.

Book Information

Genre: Fiction
Category: Young adult
Explicit sex: It’s heavily implied in parts of the book and there is one scene that is somewhat explicit
Explicit violence: Not much
Content warnings I noticed: Some racism, sexual assault toward minors, physical and psychological abuse, and parentification
This is a standalone.

Review

The prose is great. Accessible and easy to read.

I love the way this story is written. We have narrative chapters as expected, but we also get shorter ones. The shorter chapters have things like interrogation transcripts and text messages with a group chat. It’s written in a similar style to The Hitchhiker’s Guide to the Galaxy.

The pacing is good. It builds up the story very well. It’s a slow-burn story.

The themes are well explored. Most of them are very heavy, so take care of yourselves before and when reading. The theme I related to the most is parentification. I know what it’s like to be a teenager, but be like a parent for a younger sibling. I did it for years. It’s not great. It’s okay to babysit. It’s not okay for parents to take advantage of their older children and force them into a parental role that is not theirs.

Another theme explored is the fact that the justice system will ignore what some people say under the guise of truth. They discount what could be true and say they’re trying to find the truth. From what I’ve seen in true crime, this is especially prevalent with minorities and women. There’s a reason not all sexual assault cases are reported. Many times, the police make victims feel worse, asking what they were wearing. It also doesn’t help that the media tends to make their stories into a show, humiliating and vilifying them. To get a better understanding, read Chanel Miller’s memoir, Know My Name.

Maybe I’m stretching the interpretation of the story, but I saw allusions to false confessions. A false confession refers to someone who falsely confesses to a crime they didn’t commit. From the cases I’ve seen, this happens when suspects are interrogated for hours and the investigator continues to tell them they did it. They coerce the suspect into telling them the story they want. The person suspected has no lawyer and attempts to help the police. After hours of interrogation, the suspect finally confesses, thinking they’ll go home and that things will be easier if they say what the police asks. This is unfortunately not the case. Instead, they lose their freedom.

Let’s assume for a moment that the story didn’t end the way it did. Enchanted could have been forced into confessing that she murdered Korey. There were scenes where tactics were used to get her to admit that she did. Thankfully, this is fiction and not real life. However, this story is very much informed by real life events.

The characters are great. We mainly follow Enchanted, but we also get the point of view of others because of the way the story is written. Jackson always has good characters, so it’s not surprising that I love them.

Conclusion

Overall, it’s a great story. I really enjoyed it. It explores heavy themes, so take care of yourselves. I rated it five stars.