Black-Eyed Suzie is a 2002 YA novel written by Susan Shaw.
Twelve-year-old Suzie has been quietly sitting in a curled-up fetal position for weeks now... and barely doing anything else. While her sister and father are concerned, her mother insists it's only a phase that she'll grow out of. When her uncle visits and sees her, he insists on getting her to the hospital, seeing something that the family refuses to.
Suzie's case is quickly determined to be far worse than expected, so she finds herself admitted to a mental hospital for troubled children. If she wants to be discharged, she'll have to face her past and what led her to this state to begin with.
Black-Eyed Suzie contains:
- Abusive Parents:
- Suzie's mother is verbally, emotionally, and physically abusive. Her introduction has her telling Suzie she hates her crying, accusing her of trying to guilt her, and then kicking the chair she's sitting in. Prior to that, she always brushed off Suzie's concerns about her own lack of sleep, saying it was "just a phase girls go through" and threatening to punish her if she kept pushing the issue. With Suzie admitted to the hospital, her mother's abuse has transferred to her older sister Deanna. It's also revealed that the inciting incident that led to Suzie's near-catatonia was her mother pushing her against a stove and setting her hair on fire.
- Karen suggests that her father is this; she freezes upon seeing him before bolting outside during visitation hours, and she begins to tell Suzie that he'd done something to her, but is unable to vocalize it. Exactly what he did is left a mystery.
- Affectionate Nickname: Suzie calls her sister Deanna "Dee." Their mother does as well, but given who she is it's more of Terms of Endangerment.
- Anger Born of Worry: When Suzie is being discharged, Karen admits she yelled at her out of fear, saying that Suzie seemed strong to her but whenever she started relapsing, it made Karen afraid because "You're so strong and the monster was still getting you. I thought, 'If it gets her then I don't have a chance.'"
- Armor-Piercing Question: When Suzie's classmate and friend is allowed to visit, she notes Suzie's catatonic state and says "They say you can still hear us. Is it true?" Suzie begins to silently cry, though her face remains expressionless, convincing her friend that she does indeed hear her.
- Bratty Half-Pint: Deconstructed. Karen, a younger girl at the hospital, is violent, self-centered, loud, and obnoxious and frequently bullies Suzie. It's because of her own abuse and trauma, and her bullying of Suzie is from displaced fear at seeing an older girl, whom she views as being stronger and braver, being in a worse mental state than she is.
- Cool Big Sis: Suzie's 16-year-old sister, Deanna, who visits Suzie behind their mom's back, and who tried to protect Suzie from the brunt of their mother's abuse. It's the knowledge that Deanna is their mother's new target that gives Suzie the courage to start telling the staff at the hospital what happened to her.
- Cool Teacher: Edgar and Jody, two of the staff at the hospital who play with the children and encourage Suzie to come out of "the box."
- Cool Uncle: Uncle Elliot, who visits Suzie in the hospital, used to visit Suzie and Deanna at their home, and has been sending Suzie gifts and amusements while she's admitted. The flashbacks show that he and Suzie were extremely close, and Suzie's current state is doing a number on him.
- Disappeared Dad: One of the other patients, Joshua, says his father is "away" but is definitely coming back. He isn't. His father was an asthmatic and had an attack while hiking in the mountains and didn't have his inhaler. He suffocated to death, and Joshua refusing to accept he was gone is part of why he's been admitted.
- Disproportionate Retribution: Suzie recalls an incident when she was younger, when her mother made mashed sweet potato as part of dinner, which Suzie didn't like. Suzie let her food get cold, so her mother forcefully held her face and shoveled the entire portion into her mouth to force-feed her. Another time, Suzie forgot that she had cookies baking in the oven and they burned. Suzie's mother pushed her against it and set her hair on fire.
- Domestic Abuse: Suzie's mother abuses her, verbally abuses her sister and threw a glass at her off screen, and berates and punches Suzie's father.
- Earn Your Happy Ending: After months in the hospital coming to terms with the trauma her abusive mother put her through, reliving her worst moments, Suzie breaks her silence and tells the hospital staff what happened. She's able to recover, be discharged to Aunt Olga and Uncle Elliot, and she and Deanna never have to see their mother again if they wish.
- Gaslighting: Attempted; Suzie's father comes to visit her one day, after Child Welfare spoke to the family. He only comes to tell her about the fact, and then stresses to her repeatedly "She does not hurt us. You are not an abused child." Though Suzie doesn't outwardly react, she's very confused because she remembers her mother does hurt them.
- Hair-Trigger Temper: It takes very little to make Suzie's mother violently angry, whether it's not eating sweet potato to coming into the room when she's in a bad mood.
- Hen Pecked Husband: Played for drama; Suzie's father kowtows to his wife at every turn and quickly folds when she's angry. It's because she abuses him too, and he tries to placate her/won't fight back because it will mitigate her abuse.
- Heroic BSoD: Suzie's expression is a blank, dull-eyed stare for the first part of the book. Several characters, such as her aunt and one of the therapists at the hospital, comment on it suddenly becoming this way when something triggers her.Aunt Olga: Did you see the way her face just went blank?
- Hollywood Tone-Deaf: According to Suzie's mother, Suzie's singing is so grating and rough that it hurts her ears. Uncle Elliot says she sounds perfectly fine.
- It Was a Gift: Suzie gives Karen one of her prized peacock feathers when she's discharged, partly because Karen has always admired them, and partly as a good-luck charm to encourage her to speak up about her own trauma.
- It's All My Fault: The other part of why Joshua was admitted to the hospital. When he and his father would hike and camp together, he would always remind his forgetful father to double-check that he had his emergency inhaler. When his father and uncle went hiking together, Joshua was at soccer camp and therefore wasn't there to remind him. He feels that if he had been there to do so, if he hadn't gone to camp, then his father would still be alive.
- Laser-Guided Karma: Suzie's mother begins violently shaking her and shouting at her to stop acting like this while visiting her at the hospital and in full view of the staff. It leads to her immediately being escorted out, banned from visiting, and gets Child Welfare investigating her for the first but not the last time.
- Mood-Swinger: Suzie's mother swings from calm to enrage and back at the drop of a pin. Suzie recalls an incident when she wanted to wear a blue and green dress to a special school trip, while her mother didn't want her to for unknown reasons. When Suzie came down wearing it anyway, her mother's eyes narrowed and Suzie, recognizing the danger, immediately said she changed her mind and would wear a plainer dress. At this, her mother's mood instantly brightened and she smiled.
- Pen Pals: Suzie and Joshua keep in touch this way after they're discharged to their respective loved ones, having grown close while at the hospital and wanting to stay that way.
- Promotion to Parent: Suzie's Aunt Olga and Uncle Elliot take the girls in after their mother is investigated by Child Welfare and loses her rights to her daughters.
- She Cleans Up Nicely: Suzie has been neglecting her hair due to her depression, and it's tangled and matted by the time she's admitted. A sign of her improvement is when she combs out the tangles and cleans herself up; she gets compliments on her hair from nearly everyone the rest of the day.
- Trauma Button: Suzie nearly hyperventilates when she sees a picture of a campfire, and the mention of bicycles causes her to immediately curl into a ball. The former is due to having her hair set on fire, and the latter due to seeing her mother destroy her beloved bike by running over it repeatedly in her car.
- Trademark Favorite Food: Suzie loves strawberry ice-cream with frozen pieces of strawberry inside. She and Deanna eat it for dessert on Suzie's first night out of the hospital, staying in their uncle and aunt's house.
- Troubled Fetal Position: Suzie's default pose at the beginning of the book. She manages to ease out of it while hospitalized, but anything connected to her trauma - having her uncle mention a biking trail, her mother coming to visit - makes her immediately curl up again.
- Tsundere: Karen is a miniature one; while her introduction has her berating and bullying Suzie and she continues to do so in more scenes, other times she's perfectly cordial and even kind. She even shows concern when Suzie is trying to tell the staff about her mother's abuse and keeps covering her face, assuring Suzie that she won't hurt her, and then leaving so Suzie won't feel threatened by her.
- White-Dwarf Starlet: Suzie's mother used to be a singer and wants to go back to the business, but becoming a parent put her plans on hold. When she went to a local club to do a recent gig, the newspaper gave her a terrible review that further ruined her plans to return to the limelight. It's a big reason why she abuses her daughters, out of resentment, and the newspaper review is what leads her to destroy Suzie's bike.
