Will grip readers and provoke empathy
A Salvadoran teen joins a grief transference experiment in exchange for asylum for herself and her family.
Fearing their asylum request will be denied and they’ll be deported back to a life threatened by gang violence, 17-year-old Marisol Morales escapes with her 12-year-old sister, Gabi, from an immigration detention center. The sisters attempt to trek to New York in search of Mrs. Rosen, an American woman their mother used to work for back in El Salvador. When discovered by Indranie Patel, an Indian immigrant working for the government, Marisol agrees to join a trial that will guarantee her and her family approval for their asylum applications. The catch? She must become a “grief keeper” for people with PTSD. Her first task is to convince Rey, the white girl for whom she’s supposed to be a grief keeper (and who offers her a second chance at love), to wear the grief-transmitting cuff. Flashbacks provide snippets of the sisters’ lives in El Salvador and the anti–LGBTQ environment they escaped and slowly chip away at the true reason for their flight. In her debut, Villasante captures the pressures of internalized racism in immigrants, for example, as Marisol worries people believe her to be stupid because she doesn’t have perfect command of English. However, shifting the focus from loss and the complexities of immigration to the romantic relationship risks implying that relationships can remove grief.
Will grip readers and provoke empathy . (Science fiction. 14-18)Pub Date: June 11, 2019
ISBN: 978-0-525-51402-2
Page Count: 320
Publisher: Putnam
Review Posted Online: March 12, 2019
Kirkus Reviews Issue: April 15, 2019
BOOK REVIEW
PERSPECTIVES
Black is building a complex mythology; now is a great time to tune in.
Black is back with another dark tale of Faerie, this one set in Faerie and launching a new trilogy.
Jude—broken, rebuilt, fueled by anger and a sense of powerlessness—has never recovered from watching her adoptive Faerie father murder her parents. Human Jude (whose brown hair curls and whose skin color is never described) both hates and loves Madoc, whose murderous nature is true to his Faerie self and who in his way loves her. Brought up among the Gentry, Jude has never felt at ease, but after a decade, Faerie has become her home despite the constant peril. Black’s latest looks at nature and nurture and spins a tale of court intrigue, bloodshed, and a truly messed-up relationship that might be the saving of Jude and the titular prince, who, like Jude, has been shaped by the cruelties of others. Fierce and observant Jude is utterly unaware of the currents that swirl around her. She fights, plots, even murders enemies, but she must also navigate her relationship with her complex family (human, Faerie, and mixed). This is a heady blend of Faerie lore, high fantasy, and high school drama, dripping with description that brings the dangerous but tempting world of Faerie to life.
Black is building a complex mythology; now is a great time to tune in. (Fantasy. 14-adult)Pub Date: Jan. 2, 2018
ISBN: 978-0-316-31027-7
Page Count: 384
Publisher: Little, Brown
Review Posted Online: Sept. 25, 2017
Kirkus Reviews Issue: Oct. 15, 2017
There’s not much plot here, but readers will relish the opportunity to climb inside Autumn’s head.
The finely drawn characters capture readers’ attention in this debut.
Autumn and Phineas, nicknamed Finny, were born a week apart; their mothers are still best friends. Growing up, Autumn and Finny were like peas in a pod despite their differences: Autumn is “quirky and odd,” while Finny is “sweet and shy and everyone like[s] him.” But in eighth grade, Autumn and Finny stop being friends due to an unexpected kiss. They drift apart and find new friends, but their friendship keeps asserting itself at parties, shared holiday gatherings and random encounters. In the summer after graduation, Autumn and Finny reconnect and are finally ready to be more than friends. But on August 8, everything changes, and Autumn has to rely on all her strength to move on. Autumn’s coming-of-age is sensitively chronicled, with a wide range of experiences and events shaping her character. Even secondary characters are well-rounded, with their own histories and motivations.
There’s not much plot here, but readers will relish the opportunity to climb inside Autumn’s head. (Fiction. 14 & up)Pub Date: April 1, 2013
ISBN: 978-1-4022-7782-5
Page Count: 336
Publisher: Sourcebooks Fire
Review Posted Online: Feb. 12, 2013
Kirkus Reviews Issue: March 1, 2013
BOOK REVIEW
SEEN & HEARD
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