Efficient, practical Kinsey finds herself haunted after her best and only friend, Camille, dies in a car accident Kinsey survives.
“It’s been two months since Camille died,” Kinsey tells readers almost immediately, “and I haven’t cried yet.” But the crying, when it comes, is no catharsis. Instead, Kinsey begins to see a twisted, ghostly version of Camille in her dreams—and later on, when she’s awake and alone—telling her cruel, scary things. What starts as a small-town story takes an unexpected turn a third of the way in. Camille’s ex-boyfriend Hunter, to whom Kinsey has always felt superior, invites her on a road trip to San Francisco, and Kinsey, desperate and feeling she has nothing to lose, accepts. Their road trip both brings the two of them together and elicits each character’s self-destructiveness—Hunter’s through drinking and Kinsey’s through denial. Addiction, trauma and mental illness are all handled deftly here, particularly in the case of Kinsey’s mother, who vacillates between callous viciousness (“God, Kinsey, why don’t you kill yourself right now?”) and compassionate but crushing sadness. The romantic plot, which feels inevitable from the setup, resolves itself on a note that feels true to the characters.
Haunting, in more ways than one. (Fiction. 14-18)Pub Date: Oct. 14, 2014
ISBN: 978-1-4424-5699-0
Page Count: 384
Publisher: Simon Pulse/Simon & Schuster
Review Posted Online: Aug. 12, 2014
Kirkus Reviews Issue: Sept. 1, 2014
Categories: TEENS & YOUNG ADULT SOCIAL THEMES
Did you like this book?
BOOK REVIEW
BOOK REVIEW
BOOK REVIEW
Riveting, brutal and beautifully told.
GET IT
A devastating tale of greed and secrets springs from the summer that tore Cady’s life apart.
Cady Sinclair’s family uses its inherited wealth to ensure that each successive generation is blond, beautiful and powerful. Reunited each summer by the family patriarch on his private island, his three adult daughters and various grandchildren lead charmed, fairy-tale lives (an idea reinforced by the periodic inclusions of Cady’s reworkings of fairy tales to tell the Sinclair family story). But this is no sanitized, modern Disney fairy tale; this is Cinderella with her stepsisters’ slashed heels in bloody glass slippers. Cady’s fairy-tale retellings are dark, as is the personal tragedy that has led to her examination of the skeletons in the Sinclair castle’s closets; its rent turns out to be extracted in personal sacrifices. Brilliantly, Lockhart resists simply crucifying the Sinclairs, which might make the family’s foreshadowed tragedy predictable or even satisfying. Instead, she humanizes them (and their painful contradictions) by including nostalgic images that showcase the love shared among Cady, her two cousins closest in age, and Gat, the Heathcliff-esque figure she has always loved. Though increasingly disenchanted with the Sinclair legacy of self-absorption, the four believe family redemption is possible—if they have the courage to act. Their sincere hopes and foolish naïveté make the teens’ desperate, grand gesture all that much more tragic.
Riveting, brutal and beautifully told. (Fiction. 14 & up)Pub Date: May 13, 2014
ISBN: 978-0-385-74126-2
Page Count: 240
Publisher: Delacorte
Review Posted Online: March 17, 2014
Kirkus Reviews Issue: April 1, 2014
Categories: TEENS & YOUNG ADULT FAMILY | TEENS & YOUNG ADULT SOCIAL THEMES
Did you like this book?
PROFILES
A suspenseful tale filled with Ojibwe knowledge, hockey, and the politics of status.
GET IT
Testing the strength of family bonds is never easy—and lies make it even harder.
Daunis is trying to balance her two communities: The Sault Ste. Marie, Michigan, teen is constantly adapting, whether she is with her Anishinaabe father’s side of the family, the Firekeepers, or the Fontaines, her White mother’s wealthy relatives. She has grand plans for her future, as she wants to become a doctor, but has decided to defer her plans to go away for college because her maternal grandmother is recovering from a stroke. Daunis spends her free time playing hockey with her Firekeeper half brother, Levi, but tragedy strikes, and she discovers someone is selling a dangerous new form of meth—and the bodies are piling up. While trying to figure out who is behind this, Daunis pulls away from her family, covering up where she has been and what she has been doing. While dealing with tough topics like rape, drugs, racism, and death, this book balances the darkness with Ojibwe cultural texture and well-crafted characters. Daunis is a three-dimensional, realistically imperfect girl trying her best to handle everything happening around her. The first-person narration reveals her internal monologue, allowing readers to learn what’s going on in her head as she encounters anti-Indian bias and deals with grief.
A suspenseful tale filled with Ojibwe knowledge, hockey, and the politics of status. (Thriller. 14-18)Pub Date: March 16, 2021
ISBN: 978-1-250-76656-4
Page Count: 496
Publisher: Henry Holt
Review Posted Online: Dec. 10, 2020
Kirkus Reviews Issue: Jan. 1, 2021
Did you like this book?
© Copyright 2021 Kirkus Media LLC. All Rights Reserved.
We can’t wait for you to join Kirkus!
It’s free and takes less than 10 seconds!
Already have an account? Log in.
OR
Sign in with GoogleTrouble signing in? Retrieve credentials.
Welcome Back!
OR
Sign in with GoogleTrouble signing in? Retrieve credentials.
