Bawdily comic but ultimately devastating, this is unforgettable.
A boarding school is the setting for life-changing experiences in this smart, wickedly funny work of realistic fiction from the author of The Marbury Lens (2010).
Self-proclaimed loser Ryan Dean is a 14-year-old junior at Pine Mountain, where he plays wing for the tightknit rugby team. In a magnificently frenetic first-person narration that includes clever short comics, charts and diagrams, he relates the story of the first few months of the school term as he’s forced to room with an intimidating senior on the restricted, euphemistic Opportunity Hall, due to transgressions from the previous year. He’s completely head over heels for Annie, an older classmate who insists she can’t be in love with him due to his age, and lives in fear of the “glacially unhot” teacher Mrs. Singer, who he’s certain is a witch responsible for cursing him with a “catastrophic injury to [his] penis,” among other ailments. He’s also navigating letting go of some old friends and becoming closer to one of his teammates, Joey, who’s gay. Smith deftly builds characters—readers will suddenly realize they’ve effortlessly fallen in love with them—and he laces meaning and poignantly real dialogue into uproariously funny scatological and hormonally charged humor, somehow creating a balance between the two that seems to intensify both extremes.
Bawdily comic but ultimately devastating, this is unforgettable. (Fiction. 14 & up)Pub Date: May 14, 2013
ISBN: 978-1-4424-4492-8
Page Count: 448
Publisher: Simon & Schuster
Review Posted Online: March 12, 2013
Kirkus Reviews Issue: April 1, 2013
This compassionate and beautifully rendered novel packs an emotional punch
From death row, a young man navigates prison and writes to his best friend in this powerful work of realistic fiction.
A poignant story of loyalty, abuse, and poverty is woven throughout a narrative that alternates between flashbacks to Luke and Toby’s senior year of high school (presented from their perspectives in the third person) and the present-day experience of Luke’s incarceration (told in first person through his letters to Toby). This structure allows the novel to build a slow and gripping tension as it progresses, revealing the horrific events that led to Luke’s arrest only at the very end, as the other details of the boys’ lives naturally unfold. Both are seemingly white. The two struggle to guard their friendship fiercely even as Toby becomes sexually involved with a likable but troubled young woman and Luke falls for a different girl. The two have been lifelong friends, supporting each other through family struggles—Toby’s with a physically abusive father and Luke’s with a neglectful mother who leaves him playing a parental role to his two younger brothers. Readers will easily empathize with quiet, tightly controlled Luke, who’s college-bound on a wrestling scholarship, and goofy, self-effacing Toby.
This compassionate and beautifully rendered novel packs an emotional punch . (Fiction. 14-18)Pub Date: May 8, 2018
ISBN: 978-0-06-249427-6
Page Count: 416
Publisher: Greenwillow Books
Review Posted Online: Feb. 19, 2018
Kirkus Reviews Issue: March 1, 2018
An immersive atmosphere and fearless protagonist outweigh the somewhat overstuffed mystery.
A story of friendship and resilience in the darkest of times.
Every summer, Paige Redmond, her parents, and her younger sister stay with the family of her best friend, Audrey Covington, at their luxurious vacation home in Clearwater Ridge. Fun, leisurely days filled with sunshine and rafting await. And Paige is eager to finally get sparks flying with Dylan, Audrey’s handsome, competitive swimmer older brother. At Dylan’s friend Tripp Shaw’s annual Summer Kickoff party, Audrey becomes preoccupied with a previous fling, leaving Paige and Dylan to finally connect. Over the course of the summer, 16-year-old Audrey grows distant—and one night in early August, she never comes home, and her family reports her missing. The following summer, Paige’s family decides to continue the tradition and join the Covingtons. Audrey’s case has gone cold, and Paige and Dylan’s relationship has become awkward and strained, but the hidden cell phone Paige finds brings the two back together, and they start investigating what really happened to Audrey that night. The narrative is filled with a few too many red herrings and an overabundance of twists and turns, but Paige’s nonstop determination to find the truth and her underlying need to absolve her and Dylan’s guilty consciences over not preventing what happened to Audrey keep the story flowing. Dylan and Paige’s sweet relationship brings a much-needed reprieve to the story’s darker aspects. Characters are cued white.
An immersive atmosphere and fearless protagonist outweigh the somewhat overstuffed mystery. (Mystery. 14-18)Pub Date: March 5, 2024
ISBN: 9781728251097
Page Count: 384
Publisher: Sourcebooks Fire
Review Posted Online: Dec. 6, 2023
Kirkus Reviews Issue: Jan. 1, 2024
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