Thursday, October 13, 2016

We Love You, Charlie Freeman by Kaitlyn Greenidge

A stunning debut novel, Kaitlyn Greenidge’s We Love You, Charlie Freeman, is a gripping tale of loneliness and betrayal.  The novel opens in 1990, as witnessed from the point of view of 14 year-old Charlotte Freeman.  The Freemans, Charlotte’s father, mother, and nine year-old sister, have been selected to take part in an important research study at the reclusive Toneybee Institute.  The family, specifically Charlotte’s ambitious mother Laurel, are fluent users of sign language, though they are neither deaf, nor mute. In turns crushingly earnest and insouciant, Charlotte is the “experiment’s” first skeptic. The research goals are suspiciously vague, and it soon becomes apparent (if only to the reader) that the study has far more psychological aspects than linguistic ones. The general idea is that the family “adopt” a young chimpanzee named Charlie.  Charlie had been abandoned as an infant by his adolescent, cage-reared mother, and it is the belief of the research team that, if he becomes fully integrated into a family setting, it may lead to ground-breaking data with regards to language acquisition and interspecies communication. The Freemans believe that their unique gift with sign language secured them this prized spot on the Toneybee team, but all is not as it seems. What none of the family can predict, as we learn as Greenidge gives each member their own narrative voice, is the toll the experiment will extract from all concerned.  Startling secrets, both within the family, and the institution itself, will keep you turning pages far past your bedtime!


-Jennifer Wilson

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