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The Offering by The Offering

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Album Watch

The debut EP by heavy metal act, The Offering. The record features a tasteful amalgam of several...

metal

The King at the Edge of the World

Arthur Phillips

6.0 (1 Ratings) Rate It

Book

The year is 1601. Queen Elizabeth is dying, childless. The nervous kingdom has no heir. It is a...

Booksnthreads (19 KP) rated The Things a Brother Knows in Books

Jun 5, 2018

I really wanted to love this book. The topic of returning veterans from Afghanistan deserves a place in young adult literature. Unfortunately, The Things a Brother Knows has some significant weaknesses that overshadowed what should have been the meat of the story.

Reinhardt seems to feel the need to cater to adolescent hormones by throwing in a few unnecessarily suggestive scenes that really lend nothing to the plot. Is she afraid that teenagers won’t read her work otherwise? (In defense of suggestive scenes, I don’t typically have anything against them when they are integral to the story line. One look at my past reading lists should hint at that.)

In this case, the romantic relationships that develop in the story not only come off as improbably and entirely sudden, but personally, I feel they detract from the main plot line of a young man trying to reconnect with and understand his brother who has recently returned home from the war.

I will say, however, that I really do like how Reinhardt has dealt not only with the effects of war on returning soldiers, but also with the family dynamic. Not having any personal experience with this, all I can say is that from an outsider’s standpoint, the portrayals feel authentic. I also really appreciate how she manages to skirt the political issues of the war in favor of focusing on the human aspect.