Reviewed by Maalin Ogaja for Readers' Favorite

How does a suburban community respond when it uncovers a predator hiding in plain sight, operating within the very school system meant to protect its children? In Pinned, Rebecca Chianese reflects on the dissonance between a community’s desire to safeguard its children and its instinct to protect its reputation at all costs. Isa, Olivia, Bailey, and Delaney have grown up together, their lives closely intertwined with Rory (Bailey’s brother), Kam, and Hunter, all senior members of the high school’s wrestling team. When the girls gradually pull away, the boys are left confused. They don’t understand the shift and contempt in the girls’ eyes. After all, they’re only treating them the way they’ve been taught, following insights from someone they trust. Then, a private moment is made public, further unravelling the already fragile threads. Meanwhile, Emmett Ainsworth, an alumnus and former state wrestling champion, thinks he has seen someone from his high school past, stirring memories and emotions he thought he’d buried. Can what he remembers stop what he suspects is happening again? As the adults cling to the status quo, the girls make a different choice: to take justice into their own hands.

In Pinned, Rebecca Chianese explores a universal trend in which those in power, faced with painful truths, often choose silence, not out of ignorance, but out of a desire to protect reputations, preserve order, and avoid consequences. This creates a culture of shame and silence, destroys trust, and models hypocrisy instead of integrity. Chianese’s writing is restrained yet emotionally charged, allowing tension to simmer beneath the surface. She adopts an observational tone rather than a judgmental one, making the moral failures of the adults in the story all the more damning. By presenting multiple perspectives, she captures the heartbreak, confusion, rage, fear, and quiet betrayal that form the core of the emotional landscape in the story. For me, the heroes here are Emmett and the girls, the most poignant moment being when Isa and Olivia, each in their way, come to realize that the boys, too, are victims. In the end, this is not just a story about harm, but the courage it takes to break cycles of silence. I highly recommend Pinned to anyone drawn to stories that confront uncomfortable truths with nuance, empathy, and emotional depth, especially readers who believe that silence, though easy, is never harmless.