BOOK REVIEW: Concrete Rose by Angie Thomas

5/5⭐

Thank you so much to Panmacmillan South Africa for this gifted copy.

I love the meaning behind this book's title, which was inspired by The Rose That Grew from Concrete by Tupac Shakur . A concrete rose refers to a person who grows and makes something of themself, despite their difficult circumstances and hardships they face while everything is set against them and nobody believes in them. Concrete would refer to the difficult circumstances where nobody expects a rose to grow.

“like to be reminded that beauty can come from much of nothing. To me that’s the whole point of flowers.”

My problem with this book? I want more. I need more. Angie Thomas is officially one of my favourite authors. I can just read about the people of Garden Heights all day. I need a whole series of books from her. I need a movie for this book. I absolutely LOVED this book and its one of my favourites for 2021 so far. I am not someone who easily rereads books, but this is one of the few books I would read again. From the very first page to the very last, this book pulled me in and kept me wanting more.

I love her style of writing. I can literally hear her characters' voices in my head when I read her books and envision what is happening. Very few authors manage this.

When I read The Hate U Give I instantly loved Maverick's character and I was really interested in reading about his life experiences that shaped him into the man we get to know in The Hate U Give. In The Hate U Give it is easy to tell that Maverick has experienced a lot in his life, so I was very excited to finally learn about his past.

Concrete Rose takes place 17 years before The Hate U Give and follows Starr's dad, Maverick, as he navigates life. His father was a King Lord and is now in prison while his mother works two jobs to make ends meet. At the age of 17 Maverick belongs to the King Lords gang himself, is a single father and sells drugs to help his mother make ends meet, all while still attending school. He is still a kid, but is forced to step up and be a man. Everyone expects him to take over from his father once he gets older.

“The apple don't fall far from the tree, but it can roll away from it. It simply need a little push.”

I loved reading about Mavericks perspective on life. I found myself giggling at his sayings quite a few times. Even in serious situations, he manages to bring out the lighter side of matters. Maverick's difficult circumstances growing up and his tendency to make bad decisions leads to this book dealing with so many serious real life issues, such as financial struggles, teenage parenthood, single parenting, drug dealing, grieving death and being in a gang.

Through these experiences, we see how much Maverick grows as a person and goes from being an irresponsible teenager who keeps making mistakes to being a man who stands up and takes responsibility for his actions and makes sacrifices for his family and tries to be a better man. He is someone who would do literally anything for family. Instead of taking the easy way out and abandoning his responsibilities, he pushes through all the challenges that gets thrown at him and he makes it work, because he wants to be his best self for the people he loves.

We get to meet a lot of new characters in this book as well as learn more about existing characters. This really helps one to understand the characters in The Hate U Give more, as you can see what made them the way they are. My favourite characters in this book would be Mr Wyatt, as he always gave Maverick hope, Maverick's mother, as she always had his back no matter what, and Dre, as he was a good role model for Maverick and always wanted better for Maverick than for himself.

Each and every chapter left me wanting more and there were so many twists and turns I did not expect at all. There were so many heartwarming scenes in this book as well. Angie Thomas definitely knows how to bring out the emotions with her writing. My life feels empty in a way since I have finished reading this and I already miss the people of Garden Heights. I still have so many questions left about Maverick and his family's life.