Panic by Sharon Draper

Formats - Print, digital, audiobook

Publisher: Atheneum Books for Young Readers

Genre: Thriller

Audience: Y/A

Tags: POC (Black, Asian American)

Takes Place in: Western US

Content Warnings: Rape/Sexual Assault, Sexual Abuse, Physical Abuse, Verbal/Emotional Abuse, Child Endangerment, Self-Harm, Kidnapping, Forced Captivity, Homophobia, Ableism, Sexism, Misogyny, Body Shaming, Slurs, Gaslighting, Violence, Death (Highlight to view)

This gripping, chillingly realistic novel from New York Times bestselling author Sharon Draper, “by turns pulse-pounding and inspiring” (Kirkus Reviews), shows that all it takes is one bad decision for a dream to become a nightmare. Diamond knows not to get into a car with a stranger. But what if the stranger is well-dressed and handsome? On his way to meet his wife and daughter? And casting a movie that very night—a movie in need of a star dancer? What then? Then Diamond might make the wrong decision. It’s a nightmare come true: Diamond Landers has been kidnapped. She was at the mall with a friend, alone for only a few brief minutes—and now she’s being held captive, forced to endure horrors beyond what she ever could have dreamed, while her family and friends experience their own torments and wait desperately for any bit of news. From New York Times bestselling author Sharon Draper, this is a riveting exploration of power: how quickly we can lose it—and how we can take it back.

Here’s the thing about Panic. The first time read it, I hated it. I thought it was preachy, poorly-written, and out of touch. The book advertises itself as a crime-thriller about the abduction of the teenage dancer, Diamond, and the ordeals she goes through while in captivity. And I’ll tell you right now, those parts of the story are deeply disturbing. Stop here if you don’t want to read about the abduction and sexual assault of a fictional minor. But that’s only a very small part of the story. In fact, most of the book focuses on what Diamond’s fellow dancers go through, especially a young woman named Layla who’s entwined in an abusive relationship. And that's not what I signed up for when I started reading Panic. We have this abducted girl who's being drugged and brutalized, and you feel so scared for her, but instead the story chooses to focus on her whiny fellow dancers. WTF?! And that bugged me, because it felt like Diamond's rape and exploitation wasn't important enough to focus on, so instead Draper squeezed in some insipid love triangle, and some extra drama about a dad in jail and an abusive relationship. BUT, I'll admit, after a second reading, I initially rushed to judgment and missed the point of the book.

Despite what the book jacket said, this isn't a story about a girl who gets kidnapped by a pedophile. I mean, that does happen, but it's not the story's main focus. This is a book about a bunch of kids trying to cope with the tragedy of their friend’s abduction, and expressing their fear and frustration through dance. It's also about abuse victims, and how anyone can become one. And honestly, Panic was a lot better the second time around. I still didn't like it, but at least I’ve now figured out why I had so many issues with the story the first time around.

Draper has definitely done her research when it comes to sexual assault and abuse. Although abductions by strangers are uncommon (most are committed by a family member or acquaintance), Diamond’s kidnapper, Thane, is just the sort of person who would lure a girl into sex trafficking. He’s not some sketchy guy driving a refrigerator van, like the ones we're taught to fear. Instead, Thane is well dressed, friendly, and charming. He approaches Diamond in a well-lit, public food court in the mall. He’s able to back up his claims with photographs, offers to let her call her mom, and convinces her to get into his car of her own free will. This is more accurate to real life, where the people who “recruit” teens into prostitution and porn usually work out in the open. They make promises of a glamorous (or at least marginally better) lifestyle, and come off as legitimate businessmen and women. They spend time gaining their victim’s trust and learn how to manipulate them. It’s similar to other abusive relationships, like Layla’s, where the abuser presents themselves as charming and kind, and only reveals their true nature bit by bit, after they’ve developed control over their victim. Likewise, Layla’s awful boyfriend, Donovan, keeps her by his side by giving her the love she desperately craves (since her father is in jail and her mother’s never around), picking away at her self-esteem so she thinks she’s “lucky” to have him, and always tearfully apologizing whenever he hurts her. Obviously Draper knows her stuff, and is able to approach sensitive topics in an honest way. She never blames the victims (even if some of the characters do), both Thane and Donovan are clearly at fault for everything that happened to Diamond and Layla. Although, I find it ironic that Draper includes one of Chris Brown’s songs in her book about women being abused, especially since Panic was written around 2011-2012, then published in 2013, so Draper should have been aware of Brown's domestic abuse allegations, which happened back in '09. So yeah...

While Draper seems to be a pretty talented author, as is obvious from her descriptions of her character’s dancing, the quality of the writing in Panic varies wildly, almost as if Draper was struggling to find the right voice for a teenage audience. Sometimes the lines are elegant and poignant, while others made me feel like I was reading a “My First Chapter Book”. Except the subject matter probably isn’t appropriate for anyone in the easy reader audience (I think, I dunno what the kids are reading these days).


I mean, I'd let a kid read this, so I'm probably not the best judge...

Just when I’m starting to actually enjoy the story, along comes a cringe-worthy line like “This is the only place where I feel like I can really kick it." And "OMG, the show is gonna be off the chain!" or “Nice ‘fit today… I gotta get out my shades to combat the shine you’re bouncing.” Who talks like that? NO ONE. NO ONE TALKS LIKE THAT. It’s like how old people who believe that sex bracelets are a real thing think teenagers speak. It reeks of embarrassing adult trying to be hip. Worse, it makes scenes that were intended to be moving come off as cheesy or forced. Draper also feels the need to fill her book with “current” slang, pop culture references, and mentions of popular songs from 2011, which I’m sure in no way is going to make this book seem incredibly dated in a few years. And this is what ruined the book for me. Because even though Panic isn’t actually preachy or condescending with its subject matter, the dialogue and attempts to come off as “cool” and “relevant” conjure up images of every patronizing, poorly researched, and vaguely racist PSA I was forced to sit through as a schoolchild in the 90’s. So of course that’s all I could think about the entire time I was reading Panic, those crappy drug-free programs that told naïve school children their faces would melt like the guy from Raiders if they so much as thought about smoking a joint, which led to me judging the book unfairly.

Now I'm going to sit in my chair backwards to show you how "rad" I am.

Well, not entirely unfairly. Like I said, even if the final result is decent, the quality of the writing is pretty bad in some spots, and the dialogue is god awful. And here's another issue: Panic is fairly short, like, less than 300 pages in large print, but the book is divided between four points of view, meaning it’s hard to get a feel for any of the characters. And truthfully, they’re all kind of generic and bland. We get to know Layla better than the others, and the ballet teacher stands out as the wise adult, but everyone else just seems to be interchangeable, generic kids who respond to everything with “true dat” and “you trippin” (I’m not kidding, that’s like 20% of their dialogue. There’s clearly a lot of tripping going on). The worst of the bunch is ZiZi, who I guess is supposed to be the comic relief, but is incredibly annoying and awkwardly written, like the ballet version of Jar Jar Binks (and now you have that mental image, you’re welcome). Actually all the “humor” included in the novel falls pretty flat. Like when Mercedes (one of the four main characters) tells Layla her yellow butterfly shirt looks like a butterfly about to land in some butter. Ha ha? I guess? Panic needs an audience laugh track so I can know where the jokes are. At least the scary parts are actually scary. Then there are just random annoyances, like all the fat shaming and how a supposedly non-religious dance troupe says a Christian prayer before each performance. It's not that I have a problem with religious characters or prayer, it just seems weird that they're ALL the same religion in a supposedly diverse group. Is this like a dance tradition I don't know about?



Enjoy this image in your head

I know it has won awards, I know it has fans, and I know it’s not that bad, and yes, I even know a lot of my complaints are really nitpicky, but I just can’t get myself to like Panic. Instead, I’d recommend curious readers pick up Pointe by Brandy Colbert, which deals with similar themes, but actually gives us time to get to know the characters and their feelings. It's about a black ballet dancer trying to cope with childhood sexual abuse after the reappearance of her best friend, who was kidnapped years ago. While it's not a thriller like Panic, it does have a compelling mystery. Pointe focuses more on the aftermath of the main character’s abuse, rather than abuse itself, and how she learns to deal with what happened. Her path to recovery is a difficult one, but the story ends on a hopeful note.