The 'Enemy' within (book Review)

Rebecca Gonzales | Generation: Next

5/7/2008 - 5/8/08

As kids, most of us have imaginary friends, whether it's to have someone to hang out with or to have someone to take the rap for everything you did. Nut imagine you had an imaginary enemy on whom you could blame everything that ever went wrong in your life. This is the case in Julie Gonzalez's novel, Imaginary Enemy.

Jane White is a not-so-ordinary girl with a painfully ordinary life full of faults and miniature disasters that she has to deal with daily. In elementary school, however, she discovers the defense mechanism that will change her life for years to come. She writes to an imaginary enemy named Bubba, charging him with every social crime she has committed, and goes by the pen name Gabriel, making her the "angel" of the story and Bubba the "demon."

But Jane is anything but an angel and when she gets into high school and the little tragedies of life start to grow. Her former best friend, Sharp, can no longer just play in the back yard, her big brother is struggling with love, and her first boyfriend wasn't all he was supposed to be. Can Bubba really be an outlet for all of her anger? And what happens when the enemy Jane made up gets fed up with her abuse and starts to write back?

Imaginary Enemy is definitely one of those novels that you cannot put down. Not only is the concept interesting, but Jane is surprisingly realistic (who wouldn't want an imaginary enemy?). I would recommend this book to any teen looking for entertainment, and all teens who ever wished they could say "but I didn't do it." Without a question, be one of the first to get your hands on this book; you will be passing it around to your friends for months after you read it.



Rebecca Gonzales is a sophomore at Capital High School. You can reach her at nellybly22@gmail.com.