The Choking Game By: Eileen Lee

The Choking Game

By: Eileen Lee

 

For the past few days, I have read a book called ‘Choke’ by Diana Lopez. ‘Choke’ is a touching and a meaningful book. This book talks about a typical 8^th grade student, Windy, who wants to get in the ‘in-crowd’ group, not GP (General Public) or ‘out-crowd’ group. Windy is GP, neither a loner nor popular. But then the coolest kid in school, Nina, starts hanging out with Windy and plays this really dangerous game called ‘the choking game’. Windy is going through a big dilemma deciding if she should keep hanging out with Nina and get in the ‘in-crowd’ group or just stay in GP and not play the choking game.

 

There is a really important message in this book. The Choking game is a dangerous game between teens in which they self-strangulate in order to achieve a brief high. The high is the result of oxygen rushing back to the brain after it’s cut off by the practice of strangulation. This game is actually happening between teens in real life. The author of this book was once a teacher. One day, she noticed that her students were coming in with blood shot eyes. At first, she thought they were doing drugs, but later, she learned that they were involved in a game known by many names, mostly, the choking game. The choking game can kill many people because no air goes into their brains. So this is the reason why she wrote this book.

 

My favorite character is Windy Soto who is the main character of this book, because even though she had a hard time deciding if she should keep hanging out with Nina, abandon her best friend, Elena and play the dangerous choking game or stay in GP, but don’t play the choking game, she made the right choice. I think that could have been a hard decision because everyone would want to be a friend with the ‘cool’ guys. I also thought Nina was an interesting character. I always wore a scarf to hide the red mark on her neck from the choking game.

 

I like how the author started the book by explaining that there are groups of people in the main character’s school. People in ‘In-crowd’ group are very popular, GPs are students who are just normal and like invisible, and people in Out-crowd’ group are people who get bullied and have no friends. I also like how the author plotted this story. The plot is full of excitement and suspense.

 

The book ‘choke’ is very interesting and has been read by many people all over the world. The author wrote her message on the book very well, and as a student, there are some parts I can totally understand.