One of our favorite new reads that has gotten tons and tons of love is Exit, Pursued by a Bear by E.K. Johnston, a vivid and stunningly written piece of realistic fiction about a girl named Hermione Winters, who faces a wrenching decision to move on after she’s assaulted at cheer camp. What’s clear is that E.K. Johnston has written Hermione as a girl with a support system, not systemic detractors, and today Johnston’s here with an incredibly important message about why she chose to do so.

E.K.: Originally, Exit, Pursued By A Bear was a book about an abortion. Specifically, it was about a girl who chooses to have an abortion, and afterwards is not punished by the narrative in any way for making the choice. There would be no heart-wrenching conversations. No perception of guilt manifesting in college rejections or bizarre injury. No drama. All of which, I have to be honest with you, really limits your plot options.

Somewhere along the way, the conversation around the book grew to include sexual assault and rape culture (this was welcome growth; they’re all connected), but that idea of “no drama” persisted. Suddenly I found myself with a character who makes very complicated choices, but who is never called on the carpet for them, either by the book or the other people in it.

Many readers have pointed out that this is unrealistic and they are not wrong. I often say that this is the most fantasy of my novels so far (and, to date, I have: overrun the planet with dragons, turned a girl into a god, played around with history from the Victorian Era onwards, and given a girl actual super powers). Some readers get angry with me for this. The very clever ones, though, realize why they are angry, and that is the reason I wrote Exit, Pursued by a Bear the way I did.

It should make you furious that a fictional girl “gets away” with all of this. It should make your blood boil to see person after person accept her story without question and support her afterwards. It should be galling that a relatively inexperienced police officer charges a steep learning curve head on and gets it right. It should kill you that every person in Hermione’s life would have driven her to the abortion clinic.

Because that’s not how it is.

When I was getting my masters degree, I went to a forensic archeology conference in England. After a day of police officers and archaeologists talking about everything from the London 7/7 bombings to the use of radiology to prevent domestic abuse in South Africa, this tiny woman from the London police sciences department stood up and talked about digitizing evidence. At one point, she said the words “like on CSI,” and we all kind of groaned in response. This phrase was the bane of our existences—forensics was never as easy as that show made it look. I swear, in that moment, she grew to be ten feet tall. She looked right out into the crowd of students and officers and professors and said “Because that is how it should be. That is what we should strive for.”

It is possibly the most important thing I learned during the entire course of my degree (well, that and how to be absolutely ruthless at hiding Easter candy).

Exit, Pursued By A Bear has a light and breezy tone to show you that it should be that easy. To believe, to listen, to understand, to support, to do the right freaking thing. It should be that easy. It should. But it’s not.

But it could be.

Start reading Exit, Pursued by a Bear!