Review: That's Not What Happened - Kody Keplinger

Review: That's Not What Happened - Kody Keplinger - August 2018

A subject that I like to read about is school shootings, being in New Zealand we don't experience it, and I'm sure if I had ever actually experienced one I wouldn't like reading about them as much. In Kody Keplinger's latest read, we experience the aftermath of the shooting. The book is set three years later, with the last of the survivors graduating. The book is told mainly from Lee's perspective as she has an idea sparked that the truth needs to be revealed as after their class - the shooting will only become another story and statistic. She was with her best friend Sarah and another girl Kellie when the shots were fired in the girl's bathroom. Kellie and Lee survived, but her friend Sarah was killed. Now three years later, Sarah has been hailed as a hero for standing up to the killer and proclaiming her faith. The thing is though that Lee knows the truth and that it wasn't Sarah who said it but Kellie. Now they are making a book about Sarah, and the guilt is gnawing at Lee. So she comes up with a plan, for those who were the survivors to write letters of the day and to write profiles of those who were killed. As the truths are revealed, Lee will discover who started the rumors and will experience what drove Kellie's family away as she begins to voice the truth. What I liked about this book was that not once did it tell us who the actual shooter was, though the last chapter of Kellie's story does send our minds into a whirl. That's Not What Happened is the story of the survivors and the aftermath of their emotions as they try to move on with the future and their lives. 

I have to admit parts of this book did have me thinking about the Columbine Shooting with Rachel's story as she was one who it has been written proclaimed her faith and was killed for it. She also was the one who had stories of herself and was one of the immortalized. I remember when the Columbine shooting happened - I was twelve years old and the following year for my 13th birthday I was brought a copy of Rachel's Tears from my Aunty as a present.