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    Inexcusable
    Inexcusable
    Inexcusable
    Ebook159 pages2 hours

    Inexcusable

    By Chris Lynch

    3.5/5

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    About this ebook

    "I am a good guy. Good guys don't do bad things. Good guys understand that no means no, and so I could not have done this because I understand."

    Keir Sarafian knows many things about himself. He is a talented football player, a loyal friend, a devoted son and brother. Most of all, he is a good guy.

    And yet the love of his life thinks otherwise. Gigi says Keir has done something awful. Something unforgivable.

    Keir doesn't understand. He loves Gigi. He would never do anything to hurt her. So Keir carefully recounts the events leading up to that one fateful night, in order to uncover the truth. Clearly, there has been a mistake.

    But what has happened is, indeed, something inexcusable.
    LanguageEnglish
    PublisherSimon & Schuster Books for Young Readers
    Release dateJun 20, 2008
    ISBN9781439107027
    Author

    Chris Lynch

    Chris Lynch is the award–winning author of several highly acclaimed young adult novels, including Printz Honor Book Freewill, Iceman, Gypsy Davey, and Shadow Boxer—all ALA Best Books for Young Adults—as well as Killing Time in Crystal City, Little Blue Lies, Pieces, Kill Switch, Angry Young Man, and Inexcusable, which was a National Book Award finalist and the recipient of six starred reviews. Chris is the author of middle grade novel Walkin’ the Dog. He holds an MA from the writing program at Emerson College. He teaches in the creative writing MFA program at Lesley University. He lives in Boston and in Scotland.

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    Reviews for Inexcusable

    3.5/5

    241 ratings33 reviews

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    • 5/5
      Keir is a high school football player who has trouble seeing the consequences of his actions. He's a football player, and a good guy - and sometimes the way it looks is not the way it his. He loves Gigi, so he can't have hurt her. Right?
    • 2/5
      Stayed up all night reading cover to cover only to discover the most Terrible ending I've come across in a book
    • 2/5
      Chris Lynch’s “Inexcusable” examines an important issue facing contemporary adolescents—date rape—from an often underexamined perspective, the rapist’s. Lynch has created a believably deluded narrator in Keir Sarafian, a popular high school senior who plays on the football team and lives with his widowed father. Keir is by turns arrogant, insecure, oblivious, apologetic, inarticulate, sweet, and insensitive. In short, he could be many teenage boys. Keir, however, takes denial to new depths after he date rapes a girl named Gigi but refuses to take responsibility for his actions.Although Lynch’s novel attempts to tell an important story, it is not so much a story as an extended character sketch. The plot, such as it is, is skeletal. The novel opens in the aftermath of the pivotal event, and the rest of the story—told largely in flashback—focuses on Keir’s past actions, most of which establish him as unreliable narrator—a young man who is not to be trusted as an accurate judge of his own (or his father’s) character. Keir’s flawed character IS the story, really, and every other character—Keir’s father, Keir’s sisters, other members of the football team—are there merely to provide Keir with human interaction.This minimalist attempt at a plot renders the story—which, focusing as it does on a powerful and important issue—a disappointing shell. Young adult readers, for whom this novel is intended, will easily see through the thin plot and moralistic themes.
    • 4/5
      He plays football and soccer well enough to be noticed by college scouts, he loves his two older sisters and can’t wait to go to the same college they do so they can live together again and his best friend is his dad. Kier knows right from wrong and when someone he loves gets hurt he feels just as badly as if he were the one injured. So he can’t understand why GiGi Boudakian is saying what she’s saying he did. Because good guys don’t do what she says he did. And Kier is a good guy. Yeah, he knows how to party, but he knows when enough is enough and he loves GiGi Boudakian. He’s loved her since they were six. He couldn’t have done what she says he did to someone he loved…In this young adult novel, Kier narrates the story of his last year in high school and all the events leading up to the night in question, when Killer Kier (so named because of an accident on the football field) finds out that sometimes the way we see reality isn’t the way it really is. A provocative story about something that happens more frequently than we’d like to admit. Recommended for fifteen and up, this would be an excellent book to stimulate discussions in the classroom or with teens in your family.When I heard this was a book about date rape from the rapist’s point of view I was hesitant to pick it up—thinking the author would try to make us feel sorry for the protagonist, but instead Lynch gives a believable portrait of a young man who believes he can do no wrong. At first, I was livid, but eventually I came round to think this book should be read by every teenager—male and female.
    • 4/5
      Pros:
      * Unreliable narrator
      * Interesting use of contemporary action and backstory
      * Great development/pacing

      Cons:
      * Unfulfilling ending
      * True first person narrative

      So, everything that made me not like this book is why I love this book. This is such a fantastic example of not only an unreliable narrator, but a true first person narrative.

      Not only do we only know what the main character knows, we only see it through the prism of his perceptions. By the end you understand how badly broken not only the narrator is, but his entire family -- and how wrong his "truth" is.

      The end is unfulfilling only in that the main character does not get the comeuppance that one expects from an award-winning YA novel. He doesn't learn his lesson, or go to jail. However, this character faces a much harsher punishment, which is the destruction of his carefully constructed reality.
    • 2/5
      This book is about a "good" guy that does a bad thing. If you want to use a book with an unreliable narrator for something, I would definitely pick this one. A hard but needed read.
    • 5/5
      Brilliant and disturbing.
    • 3/5
      This is a difficult book because the narrator is pretty unsympathetic. The jumping back and forth in time frustrated me a little and there were aspects I would have liked to know more about (particularly what happened to the injured football player). A very interesting look at an unreliable narrator though.
    • 3/5

      I'm finding it difficult to compile my thoughts on this one. On one hand, I found it to be a very interesting exploration of an unreliable and unconventional narrator, but on the other, I just felt like I needed something more in order for me to give a higher rating. Perhaps it was the shortness of the novel, I felt like there was so much that could have been developed and explored deeper, like the relationship between the protagonist and his father and sisters. But even just his own mind... we barely scratched the surface.

      Anyway, the story is about Keir. He's a good guy. Or at least, he says he is. But some people seem to think differently, like Gigi who claims he did the unthinkable. It starts to become obvious that Keir might be lying, and not only to the reader but to himself as well.

      I like these kinds of stories that are a bit different from the norm, that take on challenging characters and, through them, take us to new and unusual places. This is not a nice story, but I find that the most memorable stories rarely are and this is definitely the kind of book that makes you think about certain things and ask questions you wouldn't previously consider. As is written on the back of my edition:

      Where does personal responsibility begin? How do we define ourselves? And are we all capable of monstrous things?
    • 2/5
      Keir is a good guy. Everybody loves him. There was just that one incident on the football field, but everyone knows he was just doing his job. So why is his best friend accusing him? Difficult to read due to the main characters disgusting personality.
    • 2/5
      A short read, with a weighty message. Keir is certain that he is a "good guy". He is also an alcoholic, and short on a conscience. He is the master of rationalizations, sadly his behavior can't always be explained away.
    • 4/5
      I've seen this book recommended as a companion novel to Laurie Halse Anderson's Speak and really, the main character of Inexcusable, Keir, could have easily been IT.The novel starts with Keir's friend, Gigi, screaming at him, accusing him of rape.I am so sorry."What are you sorry for, Keir?" Gigi screams again, grabbing me by where my lapels would be if I had a jacket on, or a shirt, or anything. She can't get a purchase because I have no clothes, and very little fat, because I have been good about my health lately. She grabs, can't grab, scratches instead at my chest, then slaps me hard across the face, first right side then left, smack, smack."Say what you did, Keir.""Why is Carl coming? Why do you have to call Carl, Gigi?""Say what you did, Keir. Admit what you did to me.""I didn't do anything, Gigi.""Yes you did! I said no!"I say this very firmly. "You did not."You see, according to Keir, the way it looks is not the way it is. How can he, an upstanding guy, a great son and brother, rape anybody? It's just impossible, because he is a good guy. Gigi must have gotten it all wrong, misunderstood him and he will do his best to convince her she made a mistake.What follows is your (a)typical "unreliable narrator" story. When Keir starts describing some events of his senior year leading up to the fateful evening, we see that maybe he has a bit of a skewed image of himself, maybe even a lot skewed? Maybe his dad is not such a great role model? Maybe his sisters are not that supportive?Inexcusable, it seems, gets some heat in the reviews for focusing on an unlikable main character who doesn't realize what is wrong with him. I never have a problem with this sort of thing. Such stories (The Spectacular Now and You) I enjoy, it's always interesting to get into a twisted person's head IMO. What I wish though is that the novel were a little longer. I think there is much more to explore in Keir's life and his relationships with his family and friends. Otherwise, it Inexcusable is a strong, thought-provoking, but not necessarily feel-good novel for young adults.
    • 4/5
      When recent high school graduate and star football player Keir rapes his childhood friend, he is forced to reexamine his self-image as a "good guy", which had never before questioned.Keir's situation and perception of himself is probably relateable on some level to most young adults. Most people either know a "popular jock" type of person or are one themselves, and I think most everyone has at some pointed wanted to be liked by the crowd, or by a special person.
    • 4/5
      This book stayed with me for a long time. All about perspective, intent, inner life and outward actions. What do we honestly acknowledge about ourselves? Do others see you the way you see yourself?
    • 1/5
      Inexcusable is about a teen named Keir and how he rationalizes the decisions he has made in his life. He gives excuse after excuse of all of the horrible decisions he has made. He tries to describe how he is a great person and that he doesn’t understand how other people could have a different opinion of him. His two older sisters are in college. He lives with his Dad and this plays an important role in the story.
    • 5/5
      Keir is a high school football player who has trouble seeing the consequences of his actions. He's a football player, and a good guy - and sometimes the way it looks is not the way it his. He loves Gigi, so he can't have hurt her. Right?
    • 4/5
      Keir doesn't understand why Gigi has accused him of raping her. That's not how he remembers it. He believes he's a good guy, and good guys don't rape girls. He leads the reader through a series of events leading up to the pivotal night, a night that seemed magical and surreal to Keir. Although clues to Keir's unreliability as narrator emerged, he remained for me a sympathetic character, one who thought and acted like a modern day Holden Caulfield. This book would be a great companion to Lauire Halsen Anderson's Speak as well.
    • 4/5
      Keir is a guy who claims to have two heartbeats, as if there are competing beings within him. At the beginning of the book, Keir show us a side of himself that seems as if maybe he has been falsely accused of rape or there has been some sort of misunderstanding. As more and more things about him are revealed, like his use of alcohol and drugs, participation in vandalism, and hazing of other students within the school, it becomes apparent that Keir is not necessarily the good guy he claims to be. Keir is quick to label the actions of others as inexcusable, but he is not willing to put that mirror up to his own behavior. The story is told in alternating chapters, giving snipets of the aftermath of the rape with Gigi and giving more exposition about Keir.
    • 1/5
      This novel attempts to address several very serious issues including parental and teen alcoholism and the atrocity of date rape at its worst. Unfortunately, while it presents these topics for discussion, it does not present the complexity or true pain of these issues well. The plot is very thin and characters, even the antihero, is not well developed. The whole story seems contrived, not that any of it could be untrue, but because binding elements seem to be missing. I would recommend this book to teens who have already crossed lines and are hanging on the edge of making criminal-type life-altering decisions. This book is harsh enough, and disconnected enough that it may reach this group of readers and readers who have already crossed those lines. I would not recommend this book to the majority of readers because they may not grasp the intensity of the situation. Due to the repeated claims of the anti-heroes conscience, the unreliable narrator of much of the book, readers may believe that he is the "good guy" he believes he is.
    • 4/5
      This is a harrowing account of a rape, from the rapist's point of view. As Keir tells us the story of his life leading up to his night with Gigi, we come to realise that he is a master of self-delusion.This is a raw look at the little justifications and excuses a person can make for their behaviour, as small inconsiderate deeds build up to horrific actions.(spoilers)I am bothered by the ending - it seems that to the very last moment, Keir fails to take responsibility for his past actions.
    • 3/5
      Once you read the summery, that's it you're have to read the whole book. Inexcusable was one of the best coming-of-age books I've ever read. Chris Lynch's unique writing style keeps you turning to the next page.
    • 3/5
      Not quite what I thought it'd be based on the rumors. Keir is a "good guy", that's what he's always been told. He has a close relationship with his father and 2 older sisters, he's involved in both football and soccer at school, his grades aren't stellar, but he gets by. But Gigi claims that she raped him. Keir knows he's a good guy, so he can't possibly have done this horrible thing to Gigi, and he just needs to make her understand that. So the book traces back through glimpses of the past year of his life, showing the events, as seen through Keir's eyes, that led up to this night. Spoilers would show why this book did not turn out how I had thought, but it still left me anxious to read it. The conflicting viewpoints of events as seen through Keir's head are very interesting.
    • 3/5
      Interesting read. The guy makes himself out to be a great guy and makes you believe his family is the most wonderful family ever, but as the story goes on you realize how wrong he is on all fronts. I enjoyed it quite a bit.
    • 4/5
      This is not an easy novel to read, but it's very interesting to read the other side of a story. Keir is revealed as a character slowly. The other characters, like his father Ray and his older sisters and Gigi, his childhood friend are well drawn and are also revealed slowly. The writing is poetic in quality, with Keir describing the atmosphere at various points in time beautifully. Besides the difficult subject matter, the only downside is the flipping between time points can be confusing. As soon as I finished the book, I went back and re-read the future segments and it all made a lot more sense.An excellent companion book for Laurie Anderson's Speak.
    • 4/5
      What a twist! Keir, the narrator of this short tragedy leads the reader to believe that he is the "good guy"... Until he commits the inexcusable crime. He is the popular guy in school who has earned a reputation as a "killer" on the football field. His peers like him and his dad aka "best friend" loves him but enables his predatory behavior.
    • 3/5
      Keir knows he could not have done something so inexcusable as rape. As Keir recounts the events, there is a darker side that casts doubt on his innocence. The voice of the narrator does a great job illustrating Keir's bewilderment. Lynch has made Keir seem confused. The reader wants to like Keir. This book would be a great one to pair with Speak by Anderson.
    • 5/5
      I know what the author named this boy, but I could have put other names in because I've met too many people who were never held accountable for their actions! This book is a great story and a vivid portrayal of what can happen when kids are given too many excuses and free passes.
    • 1/5
      Very hard to read. And after rape she like still talked to him, like it was no big deal. Gives victims of rape a bad name. Really didn't like it.
    • 4/5
      I found this book absolutely disturbing, but very, very well done. Lynch really makes the reader think Keir isn't so bad. Lynch created a really likable, but scary and disturbing villain in Keir.
    • 4/5
      What do you believe? Inexcusable is about Kier and Gigi, but more about Kier. He's a high school football player getting ready to graduate and go to college. Along this life-changing path, the reader discovers there is more to Kier than just what he says. Since we only get his viewpoint, it is up to the reader to decide what is truth and what is not. Kier is convinced of his innocence, his blamelessness in every situation. Chris Lynch writes a sparse book, focusing on Kier, his family, his "friends" and, more importantly, his self-image and his perceptions of events.

    Book preview

    Inexcusable - Chris Lynch

    THE WAY IT LOOKS

    The way it looks is not the way it is.

    Gigi Boudakian is screaming at me so fearsomely, I think I could just about cry. I almost don’t even care what the subject is because right now I am sick and I am confused and I am laid so low by the very idea that Gigi Boudakian is screaming at me that the what-for hardly seems even to matter. I love Gigi Boudakian. I hate it when people I love scream at me.

    And I don’t feel guilty. That is, I don’t feel like I am guilty. But I sure as hell feel sorry.

    I am sorry.

    I am one sorry sorry bastard. And I feel very sick.

    I am so sorry.

    What are you sorry for, Keir? Gigi screams again, grabbing me by where my lapels would be if I had a jacket on, or a shirt, or anything. She can’t get a purchase because I have no clothes, and very little fat, because I have been good about my health lately. She grabs, can’t grab, scratches instead at my chest, then slaps me hard across the face, first right side then left, smack, smack.

    Say what you did, Keir.

    Why is Carl coming? Why do you have to call Carl, Gigi?

    Say what you did, Keir. Admit what you did to me.

    I didn’t do anything, Gigi.

    "Yes you did! I said no!"

    I say this very quietly, but firmly. You did not.

    "I said no, she growls. Say it."

    I don’t see why you need Carl. You can beat me up just fine on your own. Listen, Gigi, it was nobody’s fault.

    "Yes it was! It was your fault. This should not have happened."

    Fine, then it didn’t.

    It did, it did, it did, bastard! For me it did, and it’s making me sick.

    Don’t. Don’t be sick. I don’t want you to be sick or anything. I just want everything to be all right. Everything is all right, Gigi. Please, can everything be all right?

    It is not all right! It is not all right, and you are not all right, Keir Sarafian. Nothing is all right. Nothing will ever again ever be all right.

    She is wrong. Gigi is wrong about everything, but especially about me. You could ask pretty much anybody and they will tell you. Rock solid, Keir. Kind of guy you want behind you. Keir Sarafian, straight shooter. Loyal, polite. Funny. Good manners. He was brought up right, that boy was, is what you would hear. All the things you would want to hear said about you are the things I have always heard said about me. I am a good guy.

    Good guys don’t do bad things. Good guys understand that no means no, and so I could not have done this because I understand, and I love Gigi Boudakian.

    I love you, Gigi.

    As I say this, Gigi Boudakian lets out the most horrific scream I have ever heard, and I am terrified by it and reach out, lunge toward her and try and cover her mouth with my hands and I fall over her and she screams louder and bites at my hands and I keep flailing, trying to stop that sound coming out of her and getting out into the world.

    I am only trying to stop the sound. It looks terrible what I am doing, as I watch my hands doing it, as I watch hysterical Gigi Boudakian reacting to me, and it looks really, really terrible but I am only trying to stop the awful sound and the way it looks is not the way it is.

    The way it looks is not the way it is.

    REALLY, TRULY

    There are verifiable reasons for the wrongness of this situation. I have character witnesses. Because I have character. I have two brainy, insightful older sisters, Mary and Fran, who brook no nonsense off anybody, and Mary and Fran love me to pieces and respect me, and they would not do that if I were capable of being monstrous. People like that don’t support monsters. But they support me, Mary and Fran do. Meeting Mary and Fran would convince you I am what I say I am.

    And here’s another reason. If I’m going to tell you the truth, and that is exactly what I am going to do, then I would have to tell you this about me: Most of the time, I would rather go to my room and whack myself silly to a good song than to have a whole team of actual lap dancers all to myself in person. Really, truly, I would rather. Does that sound like a menace to society to you?

    Really, I’m the kind of guy who would rather stay at home on a Saturday night to play a board game with his dad than go to a party. I have done that, a lot of times. Truly. Does that sound like a monster to you?

    *  *  *

    Ray never screamed at me, which was one of the many things that made him a great father, a great man. I hate it when people I love scream at me. There is no more piercing sound, there is nothing that runs you right all the way through, like having somebody you love scream at you.

    What he did do was play Risk with me. My dad and I had a game of Risk going forever. It started on the Sunday night when we got back from trucking the girls off all the way to college, three hours and one state line one way and three more and one more back this way, and we came back wrecked and empty to a house without the girls in it and even though that should have come as no surprise, inside, it was a big surprise. I thought I knew, but I didn’t really know, what a house without girls was going to feel like.

    We stood in the doorway, looking around in the darkness, looking around as if we saw a strange car in the driveway or heard a burglar alarm wheening, and we were standing and staring and listening for what was there that shouldn’t have been.

    He was as tired as I was, I knew it. It was time for bed for both of us.

    I don’t want to go to bed yet, he said, flipping on a light but still looking all over like everything was spooky strangeness.

    Na, I’m not ready yet either, I said.

    And so the war began. It started with my Venezuela kicking squat out of his Peru, continued through my fierce razing of the rest of South America, two frozen pizzas, one tub of microwave popcorn, and half a white chocolate cheesecake.

    Before we finally went to bed, I had been driven all the way back up into Canada, and pretty deep into the second half of the cheesecake.

    We left the board right there, on our square maple- top dining room table that had no leaves for extensions but was always the right size for the four of us, me and Dad and Mary and Fran, for all those years, and for me and Dad and Fran since the year before when Mary left for school, and would surely be enough for just the two of us now, but not with the whole of the Risk map spread out across it. We said we’d finish up the next day, and clear the table again and eat dinner there like always, once the game was finished, and we went up to bed.

    *  *  *

    I’m looking forward to it, he said, near the end of our bachelor year. When it was just the two of us in the house. I can’t wait for you to be gone.

    Right.

    Right. Why is that, Ray?

    Because I’m going to need all this space. Going to need all the rooms, to start my new family. To start my new, beautiful family to replace the one that left me. My brand-new, loyal family that won’t leave me.

    Guilty family, you mean.

    Loyal.

    It’s the same thing, probably.

    He didn’t mean it. Some of it, he did. He missed the girls terribly. And it was going to be worse next year when I went to school.

    But I kind of doubted he was going to replace us.

    I’m going to join one of those dating services. Meet the right woman. Start making babies left and right.

    Dad, jeez, I said.

    See, you’re jealous. My new family is going to be better.

    Mercifully, the phone rang. Fran. She called me every day from school. Good ol’ Fran. Thank god, some days, for good ol’ Fran on the phone.

    So who wants to hear about his fantasy family? she said.

    Exactly, I said. That’s what I told him. Here, let me put him on—

    "Don’t you dare," she said.

    He’ll listen to you, Fran.

    Like hell he will. He’ll just get worse.

    She was probably right. Nobody could really do much with Ray once he got going, once he got to having a good time. If he thought he was getting a rise out of you, he’d just keep upping the ante.

    Mary, we both said into the phone at the same time.

    We said this because he’d listen to Mary. Everyone listened to Mary. There would have to be something seriously wrong with a person not to listen to Mary.

    Mary was my older twin sister. Right, no. Not my twin. Well, not Fran’s twin, either. They are Irish twins, y’know, born ten months apart, with Fran coming just a year ahead of me. Ray said that was just a helluva time, baby-machining, him and my mom, getting started on a complete zoo of a house full of us that they weren’t ever going to stop making until somebody passed a law or something.

    Or something. Or something like my mom dying, which is what she did to us.

    Three years married, three kids, and bang, gone, so long, Mom.

    We have a piano in this house that exists solely for the purpose of supporting her photograph.

    He marches us to her spot in the cemetery about six times a year.

    I didn’t even know her. I wouldn’t even ever have known her. Wouldn’t have missed her, I don’t think. If it weren’t for him.

    Ray loves her like she was standing right in front of him.

    You telling people about my new better family? he said as he passed by the phone.

    Don’t tell him it’s me, Fran said.

    Want to talk to Fran, Dad? I said.

    Jerk, she said.

    Franny, my Franny, Ray said, pawing at the phone like a bear at a honey pot.

    Anyway, they are not twins exactly, but they look enough like twins, and they act enough like twins—in that under-each-other’s-skin kind of way—that they are mostly considered to be twins.

    When are you coming home? Ray said, sounding all wounded and needy as if he had been abandoned by the world. And where’s Mary? I want to talk to Mary.

    He had no business acting abandoned. He had not been abandoned, yet.

    Mary was a sophomore at the university. Fran was a freshman.

    Me, I was a senior in high school, for a couple more weeks. Then in the fall I’d join the girls, if all went according to plan.

    But you’ll be here for the graduation, right? You wouldn’t dare miss—

    He was cut short and started nodding as I watched him there, squeezed into the too-small telephone table/chair setup. We could assume Mary had come on the phone.

    He nodded more emphatically.

    She can’t hear that, Dad, I said.

    He waved me away, but resumed oral communication.

    Of course. Of course. Sure I know that. Sure I do.

    I watched him. He was one outstanding old geezer. A geezer and a half.

    He

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