It’s easy to focus on exciting new releases in YA fiction, but there are titles that stand the test of time and are still relevant to today’s readers. Throwback Thursdays highlights those novels with enduring themes and appeal.
It may seem like just yesterday when you read about the disturbing main character in Cormier’s Tenderness, but the current reader who is 16 years old was not even born when this book was published. Television and books today are populated with crime shows, serial killers, and loads of suspense, but these books have always had an audience.
Lori is looking for tenderness. Not the kind she receives from her mother’s boyfriends, but true tenderness where someone will notice and care for her. She hopes to find that tenderness in Eric. Eric is also looking for tenderness. This tenderness seems to always be out of reach, except for that fraction of a moment before death. The death he brings to others. Eric is finally leaving jail at the age of 18 for killing his parents. He claims it was self-defense, but Detective Proctor knows better. He believes that Eric has also killed at least two other girls, but can’t prove it. This novel will keep you filled with anticipation as Lori and Eric’s lives intersect and as Detective Proctor is determined to make sure that Eric will never kill again.
#TBT Tenderness by Robert Cormier, published in 1997
- 1998 Best Books for Young Adults
- 1999 Popular Paperbacks for Young Adults
- 2005 Popular Paperbacks for Young Adults
Continue reading Throwback Thursday: Tenderness by Robert Cormier