Bruised by Sarah Skilton (review)

Tae Kwon Do has been Imogen’s life, and at sixteen, she’s already obtained her black belt. She’s therefore thrown into self-doubt when, instead of disarming the gunman during a restaurant hold-up, she hides with another customer until the robber is shot and killed by the police. Locked in guilt and rage, she can’t connect with friends or family, but when she re-encounters Ricky Alvarez, the senior who hid in the diner with her, the two begin to bond over their shared experience. Ricky asks Imogen to tutor him in martial arts; as she does, the two embark on a romance, but she’s also got a secret agenda in teaching him—she wants to disprove her suspicion that she’s a fake by standing up for herself in a real fight, and she thinks he’s just the right opponent. This is a fresh and original topic, and Skilton is both sympathetic and clear-eyed about her protagonist. Imogen is obviously suffering deeply in ways that her distanced parents can’t really grasp, and her desperation and uncontrollable emotions are plausible post-traumatic responses. More intriguing, however, is Imogen’s grappling with her identity as the girl who could take everything on and her shattered illusions of hard-earned invulnerability. Her growing relationship with Ricky is tender but also unhackneyed in its dynamics: he deeply admires her strength and abilities and she realizes that she could learn a lot from his kindness. The subplots about Imogen’s family stresses and friendship trials are effectively woven into the main story as elements that both leave her more isolated in her plight and reflect her difficulty with forgiving anyone, including herself. YA has a plethora of strong girls these days; this is a useful exploration of the difference between fantasy-style omnipotence and the complexity of real-life human strength.