by Lauren Reynolds

Created on: May 23, 2008   Last Updated: August 15, 2011

Melinda Sordino, a ninth grade student in Speak, provides convincingly accurate details of the feelings and emotions of date rate victims. Melinda's meeting of a handsome man who leads her away from the safety of numbers and into unknown danger is a common scenario that one might read in a magazine (Anderson 165). Rapist Andy Evans' presence alone affected Melinda tremendously and caused a downward spiraling of her emotional and physical health that parallels documented reports from other rape victims. Another topic depicted throughout the book is society's view on rape along with the questionable reasons of why these situations arise. Melinda's narrative of her feelings and emotions after the rape facilitates the reader's awareness of her experiences, feelings and develops a sympathetic understanding to the turmoil she is experiencing. "I look out the window. No limos. No chariots or carriages. Now, when I really want to leave, no one will give me a ride" (Anderson 147).

Melinda's life seems like a dream when she first encounters Andy. It is the perfect situation: she meets a gorgeous senior at a party before high school begins who asks her to dance and calls her beautiful. "And I thought for just a minute there that I had a boyfriend, I would start high school with a boyfriend, older and stronger and ready to watch out for me" (Anderson 135). However, under the disillusion of the beer, this seemingly perfect guy, who would be her boyfriend (Anderson 135), is quickly able to lead her into an undesirable circumstance. Her tongue thick with beer, she could not put the words together to tell him not to move the relationship so fast (Anderson 134). This scheme of using beer or some type of alcoholic drink to control rape victims is not uncommon. "Alcohol has been shown to be a significant factor in the vast majority of date and acquaintance rapes, and in over 90 percent of all campus crime" (Lindquist 20). Another familiar element among rape victims comprises of knowing their perpetrators, as in Melinda's predicament. "The majority of rapes are actually acquaintance rapes, because in almost every case, the rapist gets to know the victim at least enough for her to drop her guard. Once she lets him into her confidence and begins to trust him, he strikes" (Haley 10). Andy, leading Melinda into a false sense of confidence, struck after that confidence was achieved and slowly sucked her into a vortex of despair, loathing, confusion, and pain.

Rape "involves a woman

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