The 57 Bus: A True Story of Two Teenagers and the Crime That Changed Their Lives

No matter your beliefs, no one deserves what happened to Sasha. I was particularly drawn to the disparity in sentencing and the thought of having restorative Justice and what that could have meant to the overall outcome. All around, there has to be a better way. Period. We could be doing so much better. An easy read that was told from a journalistic stand point.

I had never heard about this case and was amazed by Sasha’s willingness to forgive/forget the horrible act inflicted on them. Also found many of the statistics to be eye opening. I would like to know how Sasha and Richard are today.

See more of my reviews on The YA Kitten! I got an ARC from the publisher, but then I bought the ebook AND the audiobook, the latter of which was how I read the book.Despite being a complete and utter news nerd all my life, I didn’t know anything about the incident at the center of The 57 Bus until the book deal was announced. I genuinely thought it was historical fiction! But no, this is a nonfiction book about a black teen who set an agender teen’s skirt on fire in 2013 and chronicles the before and after for both Richard Thomas and Sasha Fleischman.Beginning life as an article in the New York Times before being expanded into a full book, The 57 Bus makes use of short chapters full of anecdotes and interview quotes to establish who Sasha and Richard are as well as who the people around them are in service to Sasha and Richard’s lives. Thanks to those miniscule chapters and how incredibly interesting the whole cast of characters is, the book flies by.Nothing and no one in this story is simple and Slater does an excellent job showing all the shades of gray in things like the criminal justice system. You might not imagine it would be the case, but everyone–including Sasha and Sasha’s family–tried incredibly hard to put the case through a restorative justice process instead of letting Richard go to prison.If you’ve never heard of restorative justice, look it up. It’s worth it.As much as I enjoyed the book–and I really did; it was like listening to a great investigative podcast thanks to the narrator’s solid skills–I don’t feel it dug enough into how Sasha’s white privilege and Richard being a Black teen impacted the amount of attention the story got. Had Sasha been a brown or Black agender teen, it’s unlikely it would have gotten the international coverage it did. The rampant misgendering of Sasha in media coverage at the time is also largely unremarked on, which is disappointing. When we look at things in retrospective, it’s okay to critique the failings of media at the time, but that doesn’t happen here.Sasha also has a point of view in this book that Richard doesn’t have (which is understandable considering he was still imprisoned when this book was written and published), so Richard is an unknowable figure. Even when Slater takes pains to tell both sides of the story with the help of people in Richard’s life, it still feels one-sided because he’s unable to speak for himself.After reading this book and realizing just how much coverage it got in 2013 and 2014, I genuinely don’t know how I missed this story. If you’re a news and podcast nerd like me, you’ll likely enjoy the book. If you’ve also never heard of the incident, even better. The turns the story and the criminal justice system take will surprise you. It might even give you hope for the future of the entire criminal justice system.

If you have ever wondered "what's the big deal about non-gender pronoun usage", this book will give you some insight. It's hard for me to do, because I grew up using he/she, his/her pronouns. However, after reading this book, I have more insight into the issue. Thank you.

I really liked The 57 Bus i thought it was a great book, the characters were interesting. Richard was one of the main characters and Sasha was the other they both lived in Oakland California. Oakland is a city with more than 400,000 people in it, in 2013 Oakland was ranked seventh in American cities in income inequality. Oakland is considered one of the most diverse cities in America. Sasha is the character that was lit on fire and Richard was the one that lit them on fire, it happened because Sasha was wearing a skirt, Sasha is considered agender. Richard wasn't a bad kid he just did it as a joke he didn't think the skirt would burn the way it did he just thought the when he lit it on fire it would just go out pretty quick. Richard was with a friend and his cousin Lloyd when it happened but in court they were never mentioned even though the friend and Lloyd were telling him to do it and Lloyd was the one that gave him the lighter in the first place. When the accident happened Sasha was sleeping on The 57 Bus on the way home after school. The 57 Bus was a bus two times bigger then the average bus so when Sasha was burning the bus didn't stop right away. Sasha was burnt really bad on 40% of their body on their legs and lower torso. Richard was sentenced to 7 years of prison after about a year of going to court but if he did well in school there and didn’t cause any trouble he could have his sentence reduced to 5 years. Within a week of the accident Richard wrote Sasha two apology letters but they wouldn’t get them till 14 months later which would end up being one of the key factors to Richard getting his sentenced reduced, by that time Sasha and her parents had forgiven Richard and could see that he wasn’t so bad after all. By the time Richard had his sentence reduced it would have already been 2 years meaning he had 3 years to go and would get out right before his 21st Birthday. Richard wasn’t such a bad kid even though what he did was really messed up he wasn’t doing great in school but he was getting help and was getting put back on track but then the accident happened and basically ruined what he had going. This really affected Richards mother though she was working 2 jobs already and struggled to find the time to be able to go to court but she was able to figure it out. All in all The 57 Bus was a great book.

This book was so thoughtful and clear. Fair to both victims==the boy who was the perpetrator and the teen who was the victim. Great insights into how crimes happen and how they are prosecuted.

Loved how it was written from so many different perspectives. I read the whole thing in 2 sittings because I just couldn’t put it down!! It’s definitely a binge read! The way the the media portrays a story, or how people run with it and it goes viral, can result in assumptions and judgements. Things are not always as they seems. There are many sides to a story and many facets to all the humans involved. This is an example of just that.

i didn't enjoyed this book at all. i bought this book expecting to learn about the crime and and most of everything was about gender association.I don't recommend this book for anybody, especially for teenagers.

クラスの指定読書で購入しましたがとても内容が濃かった。LGBTQの方々の葛藤や学校で問題児と呼ばれてしまう生徒の背景など様々なことを学べる良い本だとおもいます。

This book was hard to put down, it was so good.

As.ordered. disturbing tale