Books That Challenge Your Comfort Level

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I am a huge Jodi Picoult fan, even though her endings sometimes aggravate me. When her latest novel, Small Great Things, came out last fall I was hesitant to rush out and pick it up after reading the subject matter, racism in America. A review in The Washington Post noted, “Frank, uncomfortably introspective and right on the day’s headlines, it will challenge her readers.”

I started seeing comments from friends on social media who were reading it and saying they were having a hard time getting through the book. I finally requested the book from my library this past month, and started reading it on a recent trip. The book is told from the point of view of three main characters, one of whom is a white supremacist that blames the death of his infant son in the hospital on the actions of an African-American nurse named Ruth. In his words, “someone had to pay.” It is this character’s backstory that will make the hair on the back of your neck stand up. His actions against anyone who has a different color skin or sexual preference are abhorrent; as is the way he justifies his actions. Two different times I had to put the book aside and wonder if I would be able to finish it. But I stuck with it, and I’m glad I did.

It was easy for me to sit in disgust and talk about despicable this particular character was, but by the end of the novel I also had to take a long, hard look at the subtlety of my own actions. Are there ways I exhibit racism without possibly even knowing it? Most likely. And do I hide the fact that I have Hispanic roots from people sometimes, given the stereotypes that exist in this country about that ethnic background? Yes, I do.

There have been many times in my life I’ve read books (or watched movies or TV shows) like this, and I’m sure you have, too. I felt that way while reading The Help, by Kathryn Stockett, and pretty much anything related to The Holocaust, civil rights movement, slavery, etc. There are topics that touch a nerve, and make you feel helpless and angry. If a book does this for you then an author is doing his or her job right. There are some schools of thought out there that you should only read books that are fun and make you feel good, because who needs to be dragged down by all heavy stuff? I tend to disagree.

While doing a little internet research on this topic, I came across a blog post from the Babble Queen Diaries that said subjecting yourself to this level of discomfort is “the only way you will truly open yourself up to the world and to see it all in the shades that it is painted in—black, white and grey and all the other shades of the spectrum.”

What is your take on this? Should we read books that make us feel uncomfortable? Why? What are some examples of books that have touched a nerve within you?

Renee Roberson is an award-winning freelance writer and editor who enjoys catching up on novels over the summer that she is too busy to read during the year.