Voice of Youth Advocates

Anke lives in a house full of violence and anger, but she is invisible. The youngest of three children, she watches as her siblings are physically, mentally, and sexually abused by their father. But Anke feels like the furnitureùalways there but never noticed. Anke feels so emotionally abandoned that she sometimes wishes her father would abuse her too, if only so she would know that he sees her. As her freshman year of high school begins, Anke earns a spot on the girlsÆ volleyball team. Volleyball, a sport that requires communication and shouting, helps Anke to find her voice and become more confident and visible at home as she takes a stand against the violence with which her father controls the rest of the family. This debut novel is written in short, powerful poems. For the most part, the actual abuse is conveyed in glimpses rather than in a more graphic manner; however, the results of the violence are illustrated in an unflinching account of swollen eyes, makeup quickly applied to conceal assaults, and broken limbs. The transformation of Anke and her family in the final fifty pages of the book seems somewhat forced, but overall the ending is satisfying and cathartic. Offer this book to fans of Ellen HopkinsÆs work, particularly Identical (Margaret K. McElderry/S & S, 2008/VOYA October 2008), as they will likely enjoy this authorÆs similar style and content. This promising new authorÆs book will make an excellent addition to libraries serving older teens.ùSherrie Williams.

School Library Journal (Mon Jun 01 00:00:00 CDT 2009)

Gr 7 Up-Anke, a high school freshman, is the only one of her siblings to escape her father's physical or sexual abuse as her mother cowers in denial. Anke is relieved, guilt-ridden, and jealous, as he hardly acknowledges her existence. She joins the volleyball team against his wishes. As she learns to make herself heard on the court, she builds the courage to out her father's abuses. While the first 10 poems or so of this novel in verse are maudlin and overwritten, Chaltas settles mercifully into subtler character development. The story picks up pace in tandem, and even reluctant readers will plow through it as moderate tension builds. Though her arc from mouse to lion is predictable, Anke's narrative and voice are increasingly affecting. Few of the poems here are legitimately poetic, but several hit in both rhythm and emotion. The verse in which Anke measures the plausibility of living in the bathroom is among the bestall show and no tell. A lack of background details leaves readers as untethered as the narrator, and the story feels generic instead of stark. Anke's father and mother are completely without pathos, unilaterally monstrous and meek, respectively. Because I Am Furniture is an uneven though occasionally moving addition to the genre. Johanna Lewis, New York Public Library

Horn Book (Sat Aug 01 00:00:00 CDT 2009)

First-person free verse poems give Anke's outlook on a violent home. Anke's father abuses her mother and siblings, leaving Anke to observe while she wrestles with her passivity. Her position on the high school volleyball team helps Anke learn to approach life actively. Chaltas presents an honest account of how abuse affects those around the abuser and his victims.

Starred Review for Publishers Weekly

Chaltas's novel of poems marks an intensely powerful debut. Anke and her older siblings, Darren and Yaicha, may appear typical teenagers in public, but their home life is dominated by their father. Though he is verbally, physically and sexually abusive to her brother and sister, Anke seems beyond his notice (“with a sick/ acidic/ burbling/ bile/ i want what they have/ as horrible/ curdling/ vile/ as it is/ darren and yaicha/ get more/ than/ me”). The distance between the family members—separated by their silence—is palpable, as is Anke's growing sense of strength, partly due to her participation in volleyball at school (“My lungs are claiming expanding territory./ This is my voice./ This is MY BALL”). Though the pace is quick, tension builds slowly, almost agonizingly, as acts of abuse collect (a large bruise glimpsed on Darren's torso, muffled sounds from Yaicha's room that can't be tuned out). Readers will recognize the inevitability of an explosive confrontation, but the particulars will still shock. Incendiary, devastating, yet—in total—offering empowerment and hope, Chaltas's poems leave an indelible mark. Ages 12–up. <EMPHASIS TYPE=""ITALIC"">(Apr.)

Kirkus Reviews

Free verse, sometimes piquant and sometimes plain, describes very short scenes about a ninth grader with an abusive father. He beats her brother, beats and rapes her sister, but ignores Anke, invisible like "furniture." She knows she's lucky, yet she aches with jealousy for the attention. Anke narrates in first person, her brief verses denser than they first appear: Her father, after hitting her brother, "pick[s] up his reasons and his plate" to leave the room; her sister's voice is "flat as mud at low tide." Despite the copious white space, the verse pacing is slow and halting from Anke's years of living in silence. Two gentle interactions with boys mitigate her primary sorrow. This family of "live-in victims" never resists or rebels until Anke—strengthened by a powerful season on the school volleyball team—confronts her father for attempting to rape a schoolmate whom Anke doesn't even like. He smashes a chair over her, breaking her leg, but the explosion prompts his expulsion from the family. A harder read than it seems, but worth it. (Fiction. YA)