In her sophomore novel, The Silence Between Us, Allison Gervais tells a sweet love story between two High School seniors on the cusp of graduating and finding their places in the world.
Maya has just moved from New Jersey to Colorado and isn’t loving the change. Especially because the move meant leaving the Pratt School for the Deaf and all her friends behind. Now she is the only deaf student at the all hearing Engelmann HIgh. Though her new classmates and teachers seem nice enough she isn’t confident they will ever see her as anyone but “the deaf girl”.
Beau is the quintessential overachiever. Student Body President and straight A student right on track for a medical degree. When he starts learning ASL to talk with Maya, she is dubious. Thinking it must just be his attempt at getting even more brownie points to bulk up his college applications, she rebuffs his attempts to befriend her. But there is much more to Beau than Maya is willing to see, at least at first. But this is a love story, so we know that wont last long.
The story is told from a perspective not often found in literature, that of a deaf protagonist. Maya may be deaf but she doesn’t see herself as disabled, and her voice couldn’t be more relatable to anyone who has felt less than understood. Gervais herself has experience with hearing loss which gives believability to Maya’s perspectives as well as the depictions of deaf culture and the language of ASL, which Gervais indicates through all caps and spelled out words. I really enjoyed reading a book from such a fresh point of view.
Weaved through the story are conflicts that have real stakes, a cast of great supporting characters, and the underlying theme of not judging people based on first appearances or assumptions.
So is it any good? Definitely. I’d give it an 8/10 enjoyabilty.
Content rating? PG there is very little objectionable content , no language or violence and the romance is more sweet than steamy. However, some of the themes, such as a character with a life-threatening illness etc., are what push it to PG instead of G.
Conclusion: A very enjoyable novel that tells an age old story, but in a new way that makes it feel less cliché than it otherwise would be. Certainly worth a read if you enjoy a nice love story in the vein of Lurlene McDaniel, without all the melodrama.
Sarah's Library 