An intriguing story that blends teen angst and atypical celebrity.
In Masters’ YA suspense novel, a teenage girl battles charges of instability when she insists that her sister is still alive after a bombing.
Siblings Laurel and Olive “Ollie” Greenleaf, both 17, arrive from Cambridge, Massachusetts, for a final summer at their family’s Sutton Island compound in Florida, which their mother, the “world’s leading authority on adolescent trauma-related anxiety,” is turning into a therapy center. The night before the center’s opening, Ollie, the more confident sister, takes off her security tracker to sneak out and meet her local beau, George. (The trackers are necessary because their family is hounded by a hate group known as the Defenders of Morality, who murdered the girls’ father 12 years ago.) Laurel broke up with her local boyfriend, Nick, believing that their relationship wouldn’t survive this last summer. Later, she wakes up in a hospital; her mother is in a medically induced coma, and Ollie is presumed to have been incinerated by an explosion at the compound. Although her memory is sketchy, Laurel knows that Ollie was away from the compound at the time, and she later sees signs that her sister is still alive. She deals with skeptical police and center staff, the latter guiding her through therapy exercises that unearth another trauma: Laurel’s guilt about her father’s shooting. Meanwhile, Laurel gains strength to reunite with Nick and solve the mystery. Masters, the author of The Hennessey Lie (2024), crafts an offbeat scenario of media fame: The Greenleaf girls’ births via embryo implantation—their mother gave birth to one of them,and a surrogate carried the other—is revealed to be “the spark that ignited the Defenders of Morality’s hatred of [her] family.” Narrator Laurel also bemoans their publicity-seeking, cause-focused mother “forcing” the sisters to do a “mortifying” tampon commercial when they were 12. Despite this unusual background, Laurel finding her agency is likely to appeal to many teen readers, who will also likely relate to her noting, “It feels good to do something. Why didn’t I do this sooner? Because I trusted the adults in the room.”
Pub Date: N/A
ISBN: N/A
Page Count: -
Publisher: N/A
Review Posted Online: May 27, 2025
Review Program: Kirkus Indie
BOOK REVIEW
A treat for mystery readers who enjoy being kept in suspense.
Everyone believes that Salil Singh killed his girlfriend, Andrea Bell, five years ago—except Pippa Fitz-Amobi.
Pip has known and liked Sal since childhood; he’d supported her when she was being bullied in middle school. For her senior capstone project, Pip researches the disappearance of former Fairview High student Andie, last seen on April 18, 2014, by her younger sister, Becca. The original investigation concluded with most of the evidence pointing to Sal, who was found dead in the woods, apparently by suicide. Andie’s body was never recovered, and Sal was assumed by most to be guilty of abduction and murder. Unable to ignore the gaps in the case, Pip sets out to prove Sal’s innocence, beginning with interviewing his younger brother, Ravi. With his help, Pip digs deeper, unveiling unsavory facts about Andie and the real reason Sal’s friends couldn’t provide him with an alibi. But someone is watching, and Pip may be in more danger than she realizes. Pip’s sleuthing is both impressive and accessible. Online articles about the case and interview transcripts are provided throughout, and Pip’s capstone logs offer insights into her thought processes as new evidence and suspects arise. Jackson’s debut is well-executed and surprises readers with a connective web of interesting characters and motives. Pip and Andie are white, and Sal is of Indian descent.
A treat for mystery readers who enjoy being kept in suspense. (Mystery. 14-18)Pub Date: Feb. 4, 2020
ISBN: 978-1-9848-9636-0
Page Count: 400
Publisher: Delacorte
Review Posted Online: Oct. 27, 2019
Kirkus Reviews Issue: Dec. 1, 2019
A descriptive and atmospheric paranormal social thriller that could be a bit tighter.
After a Nigerian British girl goes off to an exclusive boarding school that seems to prey on less-privileged students, she discovers there might be some truth behind an urban legend.
Ife Adebola joins the Urban Achievers scholarship program at pricey, high-pressure Nithercott School, arriving shortly after a student called Leon mysteriously disappeared. Gossip says he’s a victim of the glowing-eyed Changing Man who targets the lonely, leaving them changed. Ife doesn’t believe in the myth, but amid the stresses of Nithercott’s competitive, privileged, majority-white environment, where she is constantly reminded of her state school background, she does miss her friends and family. When Malika, a fellow Black scholarship student, disappears and then returns, acting strangely devoid of personality, Ife worries the Changing Man is real—and that she’s next. Ife joins forces with classmate Bijal and Benny, Leon’s younger brother, to uncover the truth about who the Changing Man is and what he wants. Culminating in a detailed, gory, and extended climactic battle, this verbose thriller tempts readers with a nefarious mystery involving racial and class-based violence but never quite lives up to its potential and peters out thematically by its explosive finale. However, this debut offers highly visually evocative and eerie descriptions of characters and events and will appeal to fans of creature horror, social commentary, and dark academia.
A descriptive and atmospheric paranormal social thriller that could be a bit tighter. (Thriller. 14-18)Pub Date: Sept. 26, 2023
ISBN: 9781250868138
Page Count: 384
Publisher: Feiwel & Friends
Review Posted Online: June 8, 2023
Kirkus Reviews Issue: July 1, 2023
BOOK REVIEW
© Copyright 2025 Kirkus Media LLC. All Rights Reserved.
Follow
Popular in this Genre
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.
