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The Kid, by Sapphire begins with readers meeting nine-year-old Abdul Jones on the eve of his mother's funeral. It is the follow-up story to Sapphire's first novel Push, which was popularized in the film Precious. Precious is Abdul's mother, and her son's life is no less fraught with peril than hers had been. Over the course of the book the reader witnesses Abdul's progression from a loving son with warm and vivid memories of living with his mother, to a young man failed by adoptive services, molested by caretakers and hardened into a perpetrator of the same abuses he has endured for years. Being inside this kid's mind is like trying to find your way out of a difficult, he is always re-telling his story to make it more palatable to himself and other. It's hard to know what to believe.
In some ways the novel is daring and takes risks with a narrative that is anything but straightforward. Stream of consciousness writing, dream sequences and a frequently unreliable narrator make it difficult to get a handle on the story, and the graphic violence and sex can make it even more off-putting. Sapphire excels in that she makes Jones a character that garners just as much compassion as bafflement or fear. Even at his most reprehensible you absolutely understand what has created his behavior and world view.
The Kid is definitely a harder and more conflicting read than most. It doesn't end in an easy place or with ready answers, and it's hard to envision readers leaving the book with a coherent take of the events Jones sets forth, much less draw the same conclusions. In formulating thoughts on this complex novel, each of Sapphire's readers will have reveal something of themselves.
