Fast paced, relevant and engaging, The Chandler Legacies by Abdi Nazemian takes readers to high school, private high school and lays bare the privilege and problems associated with these institutions.

Told in five voices, The Chandler Legacies focuses on teenage life at Chandler Academy, a prototypical private school in 1999. Five teenagers are thrust together, being chosen for an illustrious writing workshop by one of the school’s most sought after educators. All come from different walks of life and attend Chandler for different reasons but throughout the course of the school year, discover the many things that link them all together, beyond the workshop itself.

I could not put this book down, in fact I had a few sleep deprived nights as I just could not put the book down and even when I tried to the story kept my brain locked in it’s grip. It was incredibly compelling, especially having taught in a private school environment for a few years. There was a lot of honesty in this story. Honesty about what goes on at these institutions, especially ones in which the majority of students board on site. The secrets that are held so tight and the cycles of bullying and abuse perpetrated in places of privilege. Abdi Nazemian prefaces the book with a note to the reader explaining how this story was inspired by his own experiences at a private boarding school. It’s a story filled with a lot of darkness but also a lot of learning.

The students in the story all experience some form of bullying and abuse throughout the story and their eyes are opened to the horrifying secrets that lie within the walls of campus. It’s also a story to remind readers that their voices matter, friendships matter, the truth matters. Powerful institutions can make young people feel like they are just a small cog in a giant wheel, turning and turning, cycling through abuses, but one voice can become many and with open and honest friendships, maybe the cultures in places of power have the ability to change.