We Need to Talk About Kevin is a 2003 novel by Lionel Shriver. It is an epistolary novel, comprising the letters that Eva Khatchadourian writes to her husband Franklin in the aftermath of their son’s crime. The novel explores themes of nihilism, motherhood, the relationship between violence and depravity, and much more. The book won the Orange Prize for Literature in 2005 and was adapted into an acclaimed feature film starring Tilda Swindon and John C. Reilly.

Please note that We Need to Talk About Kevin contains subject matter, situations, and language pertaining to both real and fictional school shootings, child abuse, violence, and rape.

Plot Summary

Eva writes the letters between November 8, 2000, and April 8, 2001. The letters describe her early relationship with Franklin. Eva’s early letters recap their courtship, marriage, career trajectories, and their decision to have a child.

When Kevin is born, he rejects Eva, refusing her milk and gagging as if she revolts him. For her part, Eva is shocked to find she feels no emotional attachment to her new baby boy. Kevin remains cold but grows into an antagonistic toddler. He shrieks all day while Franklin is away, but is calm when his father returns, which causes Franklin to accuse Eva of exaggerating.

Kevin remains in diapers until he is six years old. He defaces Eva’s study and takes every opportunity for cruelty with nannies, waitresses, teachers, and other kindergarten students. He and Eva barely disguise their contempt for each other.

Eva wants a second child, so she goes off of birth control even after Franklin says he does not want more children. She gives birth to a girl they name Celia. Celia is sweet, pretty, and loving. She adores Kevin, who exploits her devotion. He is often cruel to her, but Eva cannot get Celia to admit it. Celia loses an eye in an accident involving Liquid-Plumr, but Eva knows Kevin either did it, or convinced her to do it. 

At the novel’s climax, Kevin locks a group of other students and one teacher in the school’s gymnasium. He lures them there by sending them each a letter on school letterhead, asking them to meet for a distinguished award. He shoots them with a crossbow, killing nine students.

When Eva returns from the police station, she finds Celia and Franklin dead in the backyard, shot with arrows. She visits Kevin in the detention facility three days before he will be transferred to a maximum-security prison. He is finally scared. He gives her Celia’s glass eye, and they hug. She thinks she hears him apologize. In her final letter, she says that if Kevin makes it through prison, she will have an extra room in her apartment for him.