Kirsten's Reviews > Impulse

This novel, written in free-verse poetry, is set at a mental institution and follows three teens who tried to commit suicide. Conner is a rich kid with a "perfect" life who tried to shoot himself. Vanessa, whose mother is also bipolar, is a cutter who went too far one day. And Tony, who lived on the street after being abused as a child, tried to kill himself with a drug overdose. Now they are all at a private mental hospital, trying to come to terms with what has brought them there.

I'd heard good things about Hopkins, but my ultimate reaction to this book was "bleh." I knew it was going to be a "problem novel," but I had hoped that Hopkins might do something interesting here. Instead, the characterization was often either flat (as in the case of Conner and his family) or full of holes (as in the case of Tony). Vanessa is the most well-fleshed-out character, but Hopkins leaves at least one major plot element just sort of dangling -- it's mentioned a few times, and then dropped. I suppose it might be in part due to the first-person nature of the narrative, but I was also disappointed by the way that Conner, Vanessa, and Tony seemed to be the only human characters in the novel. The other patients were characterized solely by their mental illnesses, and were very rarely treated with any kind of sympathy. I also didn't quite feel that Hopkins did a good enough job evoking the different voices of the main characters through the poetry, which was supposed to have been written by them: it all seemed as though it was written by the same person.

I think this could be popular with upper middle and high school students, but it's likely to rub some more mature readers the wrong way.