Dear Reader

In Dear Reader, Tate James presents power and privilege not as background features of Nevaeh University but as the structural engine driving its cruelty. Wealth and status do more than provide comfort; they create a tiered system where morality becomes optional, and consequences rarely apply to those at the top. For characters like Nate, Carter, Royce, and Heath, privilege is both inherited and weaponized. Their social position allows them to control narratives, erase wrongdoing, and manipulate those beneath them. The novel establishes this dynamic early when Nate vandalizes Ashley’s car and then immediately “fixes” the problem by paying for the damage. This gesture is not an apology but a demonstration of power: He harms her, erases the evidence, and then uses the transaction as false proof that she accepted money for sex. His wealth enables both violence and the cover-up, illustrating how privilege distorts accountability from the very first chapter.

The Devil’s Backbone Society embodies this corrupt system at its most extreme. Its rituals, including the reckless leap at Cat’s Peak, are treated as tradition rather than criminal endangerment because the participants believe they are untouchable. Abigail Monstera’s diary confirms that this belief is set by precedent: “Everyone in the Society has enough money to make anything disappear” (55). Her account reveals a long history of disappearances, coerced silence, and deaths quietly buried under layers of influence. The society’s power does not operate within Nevaeh’s rules; it is above them, creating its own self-contained moral universe where harm can be committed freely as long as it protects the group.

James contrasts this institutional privilege with Ashley’s economic vulnerability to underscore the moral divide. Ashley works to survive; the boys use money to dominate. For them, thousands of dollars function as tools for manipulation, bribes, bets, punishments, and distractions, while for Ashley, that same amount represents months of labor. This disparity becomes a battleground where power is enacted. The privileged characters behave as though the world itself is shaped according to their desires, and the novel repeatedly shows how this mindset leads to escalating violence. Even the Paris incident, in which Carter kills a man and his mother “makes it disappear,” exposes the global reach of their family’s influence, implying that no location and no crime lies outside the protective umbrella of their wealth.

Through these layers, Dear Reader argues that privilege becomes corruptive because its holders believe themselves exempt from consequences and limits. Power in Nevaeh is not passive; it actively erodes ethical boundaries and creates a world where the privileged can inflict harm with impunity while the powerless are left to navigate the wreckage. Ashley’s struggle becomes a fight against both individual antagonists and an entire system calibrated to protect them at all costs.