Silence Interrupted

by Sania Shaikh

Two months before Troye Saavedra's senior year of high school, his father's drinking problem skyrockets. When Troye's parents make an impulsive move to Georgia in order to "help" him finish high school on a positive note, he is forced to leave behind everything he knows. Things couldn't get worse for Troye. That is, until he meets three enigmatic teenagers: Adelaide, an independent violinist with radical ideas; Zaidan, fiercely loyal and always funny; and Arabella, a girl who harbors secret struggles. Together, the four friends try to pick up the jagged pieces of their lives without getting hurt themselves. An insightful tale of perseverance, Silence Interrupted is a young adult novel about the beauty and peril of traversing the world as a teenager.

Genres: Young Adult

205 pages, Paperback

Published November 14, 2016

About the author

Sania Shaikh is a 16 year-old author from Atlanta, Georgia. From a very young age, she loved to read and write, and she started writing her debut novel, Silence Interrupted, in eighth grade.

Reviews

[T.J. Burns · Rating 3 out of 5]

Troye provides us with an interesting start. Vivid imagery and intriguing dialogue set the stage:

"...anything tastes better than coffee to me. It tastes of taxes and mortgage an all the other hassles that adults have in their lives. I don't really want to deal with that."

I can feel it. I can smell it.

We are then introduced to Adelaide's point of view. My impression of Adelaide is that she is very smart, extremely insecure, and overly melodramatic. The whole explanation of how hard it is to be a teenager is well-expressed. I can feel Adelaide's insecurity, as well as her tendency to be over-dramatic.

Weeks Pass By
It is then, at about 10% into the story, that things start to get murky. "Weeks pass by," Troye and Adelaide's voices, while already uncannily similar, start to blend into one, and the story, which was up until then tight and interesting, becomes vague, confusing, and inconsistent.

I feel cheated by the "Weeks passed by" part. We don't get to see Troye and Adelaide's friendship develop. We don't get to see how they become friends with Ara and Zaidan... suddenly, they just are. But why? How? Making friends is not as easy as being randomly put in groups in a senior assembly. This is disappointing.

What's the story behind Troye's relationship with his mom? How did it get to be so cold? The only experience we have with Troye and his mom is when Troye comforts her when his dad gets drunk and abusive (in the very beginning). It's rather intimate. Why is she now so cold? Why don't we get to see the development of that relationship? Or the history? If she was always this cold except for when she needed Troye's comfort during crises, why don't we know this? Why don't we get some background?

And then suddenly Troye is close enough to Zaidan to go stay at his house? How did this happen? And Adelaide and Ara just hop over to stay the night? Is this a common occurrence?

And what's with "A-levels"? Since when do we have A-levels in Georgia? Does a Georgian teenager even have a clue what an A-level is? So how does Zaidan's sister take her A-levels? Do they go to some Cambridge certified international school in Georgia?

...and then Troye uses the term "bloody"! I knew his family was from England, but I thought it was George Washington, long time in the US, English ancestry. Maybe he's just been reading too much Harry Potter? Bloody brilliant book, by the way!

Up to this point I thought these were average American teenagers going to an average American high school, but then a term from the British school system (A-levels) gets dropped in as if that were normal. I was utterly confused.

And then we get a new point of view. At 28% we are not introduced to Zaidan's point of view. Why? And why so late in the game? Almost a third of the way through, an entirely new voice? But unfortunately Zaidan's voice is not unique. His narrative sounds much like Troye's and Adelaide's.

Troye and Adelaide's voices have sort of melted into one voice by now as well. They had similar personalities from the start, except that Troye didn't like coffee and Adelaide didn't curse, but that's been neutralized. Both Troye and Adelaide are top-notched musicians. At the beginning I thought it was uncanny that they shared almost exactly the same thoughts, but I didn't mind because I thought that like minds had found each other. (Pretty convenient that they live next door to each other, but okay).

Troye's thought:

"If it's convenient for me to work efficiently without doing complicated steps, why can't I? I present to you: the American public school system."

Adelaide's response as to why she didn't show her work on the math assignment:

"I didn't need to. I could figure it out in my head. Isn't that the goal of the school system? Efficiency?"

Troye and Adelaide keep acting and thinking more and more alike as the story goes along, and I can't help thinking that they are one and the same voice. And now we have Zaidan, and his voice is pretty much the same as the other two.

Up until the "Weeks passed by" section mentioned above, the story was tight, the dialogue engaging. But after that it feels more like a conglomerate of disconnected thoughts, metaphors, and occurrences.

Out of the blue Ara has a nervous break-down. The trigger is that she misses her little brother's piano recital. That can hardly be the real reason, but that's all we're offered. We also find that Ara thinks she's a fuck-up, but we don't get any explanation as to why she feels this way. We later find out that she cuts herself with razor blades and is possibly suicidal.

Okay, it is possible for someone who has seemingly got it all together to have all these deep psychological problems without anyone noticing. It's a bit harder to believe that Ara's boyfriend, who has known her for 7 years is totally clueless about all this, but okay. Let's say her old and new friends, and her brother, really don't know. Still. There has to be a reason. The only explanation offered here is that it is hard being a teenager and that teenagers take disappointment harder than others. But we don't even know why Ara considers herself a screw-up or what sort of disappointment she has experienced. And as I continued to read, I had little hope that I was actually going to get a satisfactory explanation, or the background for her psychological problems.

Self-inflicted harm and teen suicides are big issues. I don't want to belittle them. But this story is belittling these very real psychological problems by suggesting that adolescence alone is cause for such drastic actions.

Trying to follow the story and the different voices, which are not really different, is confusing.

The second paragraph in the chapter from Zaidan's point of view has Zaidan getting a text message from Ara. Only the text message is to Adelaide:
Hey Del! I see that you took the razors under the sink and in the cabinet...

Why is Ara writing a message to Del on Zaidan's phone? Did she want Zaidan to know but couldn't tell him directly? We'll never know.

Later in the chapter that is supposed to be from Zaidan's point of view we read:
Zaidan looks offended for a moment; then he shrugs his shoulders and nods.

Why are we getting Zaidan's actions in third person when it is Zaidan who is narrating this chapter in first person? I suspect this chapter was originally written as someone else's voice (either Troye's or Adelaide's -- doesn't really matter, they're pretty much the same).

I have the feeling only the first 13% of this book has been professionally edited -- up until "Weeks pass by. Fall slips into winter."

And questions continue to accumulate. Where are Ara's parents? After having a nervous breakdown, in which she cuts herself up, and spends days (maybe more) in bed, Ara just goes off to spend the night on top of the high school tower and doesn't even tell her parents that she is going?

And what am I supposed to make of comments like this:
[Ara]'s trying to block out her painful existence.

This thought is coming from Zaidan. But I thought Zaidan didn't know about Ara's problems until she had the breakdown. And now he's psycho-analyzing her? But why is her existence painful? Please won't someone tell me? Because she's an adolescent girl? Bzzzzz. Wrong answer. Thank you for playing. This is getting so tiring. I'm reading about all this pain and yet... no one is actually experiencing pain. At least not in any way that we, the readers, can feel it, and share in the experience.

Inconsistencies, such as the following comment, don't help matters either:
Adelaide says, Troye never struck me as the reading type.

Huh? The very first time you met him, he recited (by heart!) a passage from Now I Know Why The Caged Bird Sings. And he never struck you as the reading type, Adelaide? Hmmmm. What type is he then?!

Some answers to my many, many questions are provided, but I am still waiting for others. My main question is: Are these teenagers as broken as they claim to be and if so, why?

There’s an unfaithful husband, a distanced mother, an alcoholic who gets himself into a near fatal accident, but has the gall to tear down the only people who came to see if he’s alright. We have a father who left years ago, and a formerly financially well-off mother struggling to make ends meet.

And then lo and behold at 64%, we have a totally new point of view. Arabella. This POV, like Zaidan’s, seems totally unnecessary for purposes of this story. We get no insight as to why Arabella would cut herself as a reaction to her mother’s tyrannical personality and her parents’ dysfunctional marriage. We see that Arabella does not have her mother’s love and support, but we have no clue what has driven her to think cutting herself with a razor blade will help. Since we, the readers, are still on the outside, I think this chapter would have better been dealt with from someone else’s POV, say Adelaide’s. It seems much too late in the game to introduce a new POV. Arabella has been in the story from the start, so why do we just get to hear from her now?

Even with all the soap opera drama, there’s a lot of disconnect. Random events pasted together. It feels more like four teenagers’ journals pasted together – random musings on life, its meaning, how difficult life is for teenagers, etc. and so forth.

The story is no longer tight, and the dialogue no longer crisp and witty. Instead of the intelligent and clever come-backs that we experienced in the beginning of the book, Adelaide resorts to the über-intelligent phrase of “Oh, shut up” much too often for my tastes. I did a search and found “shut up” was said 16 times, mostly by Adelaide -- starting at 20%. She is, however, expressing what I was feeling while reading this…


Thoughts & Conclusions

I thought this story has great potential. It starts out vivid, interesting, intriguing.

I really like the role the instruments play, but this aspect, like most aspects in this book, was not tight enough. Why did we need to go to the elementary school orchestra concert? Why do we need those characters? A lot of characters and events were extraneous and didn't help the flow of the story. On the contrary, they hindered it.

And then there were important characters that we did not get a chance to get to know. Xavier and his adopted daughter? What's up with them? Ara's mother? Why is she so bitter? Even Troye's father? What happened to him along the way? It's not enough to blame alcohol for everything. Sure alcohol is a problem, but it's a symptom. Where did things start to go wrong? Why did he grab for the bottle to ease the pain? And Ara? What is her story? Why is she cutting herself? How does that make her feel? How did she come up with this drastic reaction to her situation?

I'm afraid I don't get the "silence" metaphor. First silence is the adversary and then silence is not the adversary, but we are not told why and what has changed to swing this metaphor around 180 degrees.

I think this story has great potential, but needs to undergo a rigorous editing process. I recommend one point of view, probably Troye's. The author should ask herself where the story is going. Where does she want to take the readers? And then she should cut out everything that doesn't move in that direction, and add information to get us to the desired goal.

2.5
I received a copy of this book from the publisher via NetGalley in exchange for an honest review.

BUDDY READ: Contemporary/Romance > Silence Interrupted by Sania Shaikh - Starting January 23rd 2017
https://www.goodreads.com/topic/show/...

[Miranda · Rating 1 out of 5]

Trigger warnings upcoming. This was a rough read and felt like it was kind of one of those let’s try and touch all the bad topics in one go and good luck if you make it to the other side. I however was not impressed nor pleased whilst reading. It felt raw, sad (depressing), and slow. A lot of authors seem to be of the mindset let’s throw the whole kitchen sink in our book and expect the readers to keep up, which really makes it hard to find these types of books likable.
I finished but put this one down so much in hopes of filling myself of better words between the pages. Alas it didn’t work and I felt robbed of my time.

[Sally · Rating 2 out of 5]

I didn't like this at first, and then I grew to love it, and then I got a bit bored and was back to square one. The start to me felt a bit odd, like we'd come in right in the middle and it took a while before things began to make sense. Then it all started to come together and I figured out what was going on and it was pretty cool and the characters were interesting. But then it just started to feel a bit too wooden and wordy and alas those were the notes it ended on for me.

[Celinda Reyes · Rating 1 out of 5]

For my full thoughts on this book please check out my blog post here “http://celindareyesblog.com/2018/10/m...“

[Louanne · Rating 4 out of 5]

The story of four teens who develop a camraderie during their senior year of high school, their stories are both independently poignant and collaboratively united.

[Laura · Rating 5 out of 5]

Awesome. These high schoolers all are dealing with life, parents, their futures. They have different coping methods....but they have real relationships and real lives otherwise. I liked how they discussed music, literature ect. Their relationships with their parents weren't explored much but they were well developed.

[Beyond Words · Rating 5 out of 5]

Disclaimer: I received a copy of this book from the publisher via NetGalley in exchange for an honest review and I'd like to thank them in letting me read an advance reader's copy of Silence Interrupted by Sania Shaikh for its release.

This book was such an amazing read. It touches upon very impactful subjects and some of their effect: alcoholism, suicide, love, friendships, somewhat diverse, etc. The writing is absolutely lovely and quite easy to read. On that note, characters were relatable and I could relate some aspects with my friends. They are witty, fun yet serious, odd but in a good way... They were 3 dimensional, not flat plain characters. There are plenty of "so remarkably true" moments, eye-opening, greatly worded events. I got quite immersed within the story that contains lots of different layers. The author included some "popular"/"partially known" books and music which was fantastic. I know listen to one of the songs called Take me to church by Hozier. It was exquisite.

However, there are never subsections within someone's point of view. What I mean by that is that the "subject" can change entirely (ex: scenery, main problem of the section previously read, etc). Instead, I think the author should have did: dot dot dot. With that being in the middle of the two "subjects", it will be a little clearer. Moreover, some points were confusing. I had to reread that section multiple times to understand it. When Ara was talking to Zaidan in the third person, I couldn't comprehend what was going on whatsoever. I still understand it partially from interpretation.

Overall, other than those more to the negative side of things, this was a great book that became one of my favourites.

[Jeanny · Rating 3 out of 5]

Received a copy of this book via Netgalley for an honest review.

Rating: 3.5 stars.

Reading Silence Interrupted was a great start to my reading year because boy, was it refreshing. It's about four friends who go through their senior year where they find out more about themselves and each other. First and foremost, there was no romance at all, even though two of them were officially a couple in the story, there was none of those cheesy bullshit that you find in dime-a-dozen contemporary ya books out there. The other two MCs had a couple of awkward moments (and plenty of teasing from their friends) but had a platonic relationship all through out. The characters also developed exceedingly well throughout the story.
Which brings me to my next point - yes it was refreshing, but it definitely made up for it with the inappropriate, unneeded, complex philosophizing done by almost all of them. Everyone basically had teenage angst written all over their heads. They talked about the "deep stuff" after every other paragraph that it basically took up the entire novel. The events were rushed and the author could have done better in building up to the ending (it was definitely unexpected) but otherwise, the characters ended up being its saving grace. The themes being discussed are timely, well illustrated and very realistic. It captured the grays, not just the blacks and whites, which I think is very important. Overall, I would recommend Silence Interrupted to people who love literature references, hate Starbucks, and play music but aren't really prodigies.

[alex · Rating 3 out of 5]

this book was written by a sixteen-guest-old muslim girl from atlanta, which is awesome and the fact that she began writing it in eighth grade is impressive. i'm excited to see what she does in the future.