The 57 Bus: A True Story of Two Teenagers and the Crime that Changed Their Lives (2017)

Slater breaks from traditional narrative nonfiction in the way she structures this book. By using short vignettes, often without context or commentary, Slater is reflecting the fragmentary nature of teenage life and the haphazard way that Richard and Sasha’s lives intersected. Slater challenges the reader to make meaning from her headings and the juxtaposition of certain texts with others; by splitting the book into four parts, she has also marked those four things as being distinct and separate, even as they come together.

Slater chooses to present some of the story in the form of poems—mostly ones she has assembled from quotations or social media. Some of these poems are on difficult topics, such as “Trust Issues,” and Slater uses poetry to both soften and increase the impact of the text. Poems are artful and stylized, turning everyday moments into something bigger. “Say they got your back / as they get their knives out” (101) sums up Richard’s fears of his peers elegantly and simply, even beautifully.

Other sections quote directly from official documents, introducing the reader to the cold, black and white language of bureaucracy without commentary from the author.