No Shame is a much harder story than its prequel, No Virgin. Stacey is very much a changed girl - that much is evident in the writing style and the sense of hopelessness exuding from her. She’s given up her dream of fashion design, changed her hair, moved on from Bella, yet still remains stuck in the past - haunted by what was and what could have been.
That’s not to say that No Shame is a hopeless book, oh no, it’s just more of a… tentative hope. There’s still the chance that things won’t go smoothly in court, but the fact that Stacey went to court is a shining beacon in itself. The last twenty or so pages push the same amount of hope found in the first book, and I found that this created a balance.
However. I do think that this balance wasn't entirely realistic, and was in fact a bit of an imbalance. Hence the three star rating. While I was happy that Stacey found a happy ending, I was also a bit… let down by it. I didn’t want her to suffer by any means - god knows she’s done enough of that over the course of her story - but I was hoping for something a bit grittier to match her tone. As it stands, the ending felt almost like she’d flipped back to her regular mood with little to no working things out, and I would have liked some acknowledgement of situations that don’t end happily.
But with that being said, I did like this and felt that it wrapped Stacey’s story up in a way that didn’t leave any loose ends. Could it have been fleshed out a bit more? Definitely. But is it a good young adult eye-opener to the horrors of rape and sexual assault? Yes. And I’d like to think that it can help some people, too.
That’s not to say that No Shame is a hopeless book, oh no, it’s just more of a… tentative hope. There’s still the chance that things won’t go smoothly in court, but the fact that Stacey went to court is a shining beacon in itself. The last twenty or so pages push the same amount of hope found in the first book, and I found that this created a balance.
However. I do think that this balance wasn't entirely realistic, and was in fact a bit of an imbalance. Hence the three star rating. While I was happy that Stacey found a happy ending, I was also a bit… let down by it. I didn’t want her to suffer by any means - god knows she’s done enough of that over the course of her story - but I was hoping for something a bit grittier to match her tone. As it stands, the ending felt almost like she’d flipped back to her regular mood with little to no working things out, and I would have liked some acknowledgement of situations that don’t end happily.
But with that being said, I did like this and felt that it wrapped Stacey’s story up in a way that didn’t leave any loose ends. Could it have been fleshed out a bit more? Definitely. But is it a good young adult eye-opener to the horrors of rape and sexual assault? Yes. And I’d like to think that it can help some people, too.