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Important Moderator's Note: The book has been edited since the review to fix the editing issue mentioned by the reviewer.
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3 out of 4 stars
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Dyed Souls by Gary Santorella is a coming-of-age story that follows the life of Charles Lyle. Charles was placed into Hawthorne, a facility for children, by his mother who cannot take care of him. Charles struggles with life at Hawthorne because previously he lived with his grandparents until his mother took him away from them. At Hawthorne, Charles is different from the rest of the children; he is interested in evolutionary theory and other scientific works. Charles hopes that by reasoning through Charles Darwin’s book, The Descent of Man, will allow him to understand people, his mother, and, most importantly, himself.
Dyed Souls has to be one of the best books I’ve read recently. Santorella truly captured the confusing feelings of being a teenager while still maintaining an engaging storyline. One of the strong points of the book was the characterization. Every character described in the work was dynamic and well developed. One unexpectantly intriguing character was Javier. When we first encounter Javier, we see him through the eyes of Charles. Charles believes him to be the typical conceited gangster. As time goes on, Javier’s true nature is revealed. Javier is really a highly intelligent and kind-hearted young man. This characterization is also extended to Charles. Charles is far from perfect, but he has the best intentions in mind. I really enjoyed how Santorella had Charles make miscalculations about people’s characters and act as a typical teenager would. While I still would consider Charles to be a good person, he had his bad moments. For example, Charles is initially jealous of Javier because he views him as competition for the hand of Margo, a young girl also living at Hawthorne. This subplot is carried out in a realistic manner and adds depth to the three characters. Additionally, I thought that the novel provided interesting insight into the circumstances of at-risk children. It was heartbreaking to read about some of the stories of the children living at the facility. For example, Walter was a young boy at Hawthorne who had difficulty speaking. This was a result of his mother preventing him from speaking “so the devil couldn’t find him.” I felt for him and the other abused children at Hawthorne.
I did not have many complaints about the novel. The main issue I had dealt with the flow of speech. Some of the dialogue for the minority characters was a little off. For instance, Margo and Javier’s dialogue was frequently peppered with the word “yo”. It was off-putting after a while and I thought that their dialogue would have flowed better without its inclusion.
While Dyed Souls was a very enjoyable book, it did have some issues with editing. Most of the errors dealt with homonym use. One example included the use of strait instead of straight. While the errors did not detract from my enjoyment of the novel, they did indicate that the book still needs to be professionally edited.
I rate Dyed Souls 3 out of 4 stars. While I thought that the story itself was excellent, the editing issues prevent me from giving it 4 out of 4 stars. The novel deals with some heavy topics such as underage sexual situations, sexual and physical assault, and child abuse. As a result, I would recommend this book to older teenagers and adults. This book would not be suitable for younger or more sensitive audiences.
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Dyed Souls
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