Special Report: 'Second Impact'

Special Report

Second Impact

David Klass and Perri Klass

Kendall is football town, and Jerry Downing is the high school's star quarterback, working to redeem himself after he nearly killed a girl in a drunk driving accident last year. Carla Jenson, lead reporter for the school newspaper's sports section, has recruited Jerry to co-author a blog chronicling the season from each of their perspectives. When Jerry's best friend on the team takes a hit too hard and gets hurt, Carla wonders publicly if injury in the game comes at too high a cost in a player's life—but not everyone in Kendall wants to hear it...

I liked Jerry's character. He was kind and caring. You could tell he cared for his friends and teammates. Stereotypically, you think quarterbacks are stuck-up jerks. In this case, Jerry is anything bit that. (The stuck-up one would be Carla really. I really don't like her.) Jerry cared for Danny. He made sure Danny didn't play when he had the signs of a concussion. That shows his kindness. You start to like Jerry. You feel for him. His rage. His delight. 

The themes of this story was good. Teamwork. Sportsmanship. You read this book and feel those themes in the writing. I like those themes. People need to band together to be stronger. As one person, you can only do so much. You need to be together with other people. Also, there is the question of taking things too far. Not a theme but something I still wanted to mention. Carla takes things too far. Is her punishment just? Did she take it too far? What could she have done to stop? 

There didn't seem to be much plot, though. There are only a few points. But then it's babbling for most of the beginning and middle. Only when we get Carla doing terrible things we have something. I feel like there could have been more changes. The plot seemed slow. And it wasn't very interesting. It could have been better. 

I didn't like the drama. Ah. It was annoying. Carla was just too crazy. She took things too far. She forced drama to happen. When drama wasn't there. At all. Everyone in the book tried to avoid drama. But she just caused it left and right. I didn't like that. She could have left things. But she had to be nosy and find secrets. 

And Carla was annoying. Really annoying. She was nosy. And spoiled. She stuck her head in things she shouldn't have. She was crazy. She was acting stupid. She didn't need to do that. She caused things. She acting very annoying. Whiny. She kept acting that way. She didn't change. Sure. She learned a lesson about pushing limits. I'm happy she learned a lesson. But she didn't change.

Weather:

Sunny with 50% chance of rain

3/5