 Cover of The Reluctant Journal of Henry K. Larsen | |
| Author | Susin Nielsen |
|---|---|
| Cover artist | Jennifer Lum |
| Language | English |
| Publisher | Tundra Books |
| Publication place | Canada/United States of America |
| Pages | 243 |
| ISBN | 978-1-77049-372-8 |
The Reluctant Journal of Henry K. Larsen is a young adult novel by Canadian author Susin Nielsen, first published in 2012. It deals with the effects of a school shooting on the shooter's family.
"I was reading a book by Wally Lamb called The Hour I First Believed. One of his characters was present at a horrific school Homicide. There was a line in the book that mentioned that one of the shooters had an older brother. That just punched me in the gut; I realized I had never thought about what it would be like for the surviving sibling of someone who committed a horrific crime. From there, Jesse and Henry were born. Jesse, relentlessly bullied to the point of murder/suicide; Henry, the brother left behind". [1]
After his older brother takes his dad's gun to school to kill himself and his bully, Henry K. Larsen is thrown into a brand new town and a brand new school in order to escape the anger of his old friends and neighbors. In this new town, Henry fights to keep knowledge of the "IT" from tainting his new friends' views of him the way it did back home. Henry begins to understand what it means to grieve for a loved one who has committed suicide, even through your anger. Through his own experience at school Henry starts to realize the desperate position his brother was in and the impact that bullying had not only on his brother but on his new friends now. Henry never sugarcoats how he feels and explores the emotions he knows he should not have.
| Year | Award | Result | Ref. |
|---|---|---|---|
| 2012 | Governor General's Award for English-language children's literature | Winner | [2] [3] [4] |
| 2013 | Canadian Library Association Book of the Year for Children Award | Winner | [5] |
| Ruth and Sylvia Schwartz Award | Winner | [6] | |
| Sheila A. Egoff Children's Literature Prize | Finalist | [7] | |
| 2014 | Forest of Reading Red Maple Award | Winner | [8] |
| Snow Willow Award | Nominee | [9] | |
| TD Canadian Children's Literature Award | Finalist | [10] |
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Susin Nielsen is a Canadian author for children, adolescents and young adults. She received the 2012 Governor General's Award for English-language children's literature and the 2013 Canadian Library Association Book of the Year for Children Award for her young adult novel The Reluctant Journal of Henry K. Larsen, which deals with the aftermath of a school shooting.
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