A gentle and compelling coming-of-age story.
In Bryan’s debut YA novel, a teenage boy adjusts to life on his grandfather’s ranch and takes a stand against animal cruelty.
Matt Barrett, a 14-year-old, finds himself on a bus from Chicago to Los Angeles; sent away by his alcoholic mother and her abusive boyfriend, Matt goes to stay with his grandfather Silas Phillips and help out on his ranch. Unhappy even before he arrives, Matt soon grows utterly miserable. Silas is stern and unaffectionate and puts him to work mucking out stables. Matt’s days are long and tiring, and there’s no phone reception. His only true friend on the ranch is the housekeeper Esmerelda Montoya, whose cooking enchants everyone and whose Native American Tongva heritage seems to afford her a deep connection to the land. As the weeks pass, Matt starts to feel more at home and bonds with some of the horses. Working as a stable hand, he is assigned to help Robert Sinclair, a callous trainer who leases barn space at the ranch. Sinclair cares only for money, and employs brutal, illegal practices when preparing his horses for show events. Matt is shocked, but the ranch is in financial trouble and Silas doesn’t want to hear about what Sinclair is doing. Can Matt end the horses’ abuse without ruining his grandfather’s livelihood? The prose is straightforward but elegant (“He stared at the traffic. It flowed like the liquid mercury in Mr. Rocker’s science class, cascading down the pass in its shiny liquid form, fast-moving, unstoppable, poisonous quicksilver”), serving both to relate the story and to capture the simplicity of life on a working ranch. Matt makes for a relatable protagonist: His family life is tough, and he is justifiably self-pitying until the change in his environment brings out the best in him. The plot moves slowly but unfolds in a natural, rather appealing fashion; Bryan takes time to describe things like different horse gaits and to detail the building of a sweat lodge to build the novel’s world, grounding the narrative in a sense of place and adding weight to the revelations of animal cruelty. Readers both teenage and adult, horse-loving and horse-ignorant, should find themselves heavily invested in Matt’s life on the ranch.
A gentle and compelling coming-of-age story.Pub Date: Jan. 10, 2023
ISBN: 978-1639887286
Page Count: 338
Publisher: Atmosphere Press
Review Posted Online: March 23, 2023
Kirkus Reviews Issue: May 15, 2023
Review Program: Kirkus Indie
A compelling romance inhabited by complex and appealing characters.
When star hockey player Alec Barczewski’s estranged childhood friend, Dani Collins, moves to town, they end up in a mutually beneficial fake-dating relationship that reignites old feelings.
Following her parents’ divorce, Dani and her mom move in with Dani’s hockey legend grandfather in Southview, Minnesota, where she spent a month every summer as a child and where her friendship with Alec grew. Between visits, the two were pen pals, but they eventually fell out of touch. Despite some tensions over their loss of friendship, the high school seniors reconnect. Desperate to get off Harvard’s waitlist, Dani needs another extracurricular activity, while Alec—whose reputation took a hit when a photo of him holding a bong appeared on social media—is eager to improve his tarnished image for NHL scouts. The pair strike a deal: They’ll fake date, making Alec look like a stable guy whose academically gifted girlfriend is related to hockey royalty, and in exchange, he’ll get Dani a team manager position that will catch the eye of Harvard’s admissions officers. Eventually, complicated feelings about their past, stressful family relationships, and their brewing romance boil over. Romance fans will love the deliciously tension-filled scenes between Alec and Dani, who are believable friends with heavy demands weighing on them. They feel like real teenagers, and readers will enjoy rooting for them as the well-paced story unfolds. Main characters present white.
A compelling romance inhabited by complex and appealing characters. (Romance. 14-18)Pub Date: Sept. 30, 2025
ISBN: 9781665921268
Page Count: 448
Publisher: Simon & Schuster
Review Posted Online: Aug. 2, 2025
Kirkus Reviews Issue: Sept. 1, 2025
An ode to the children of migrants who have been taken away.
A Mexican American boy takes on heavy responsibilities when his family is torn apart.
Mateo’s life is turned upside down the day U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement agents show up unsuccessfully seeking his Pa at his New York City bodega. The Garcias live in fear until the day both parents are picked up; his Pa is taken to jail and his Ma to a detention center. The adults around Mateo offer support to him and his 7-year-old sister, Sophie, however, he knows he is now responsible for caring for her and the bodega as well as trying to survive junior year—that is, if he wants to fulfill his dream to enter the drama program at the Tisch School of the Arts and become an actor. Mateo’s relationships with his friends Kimmie and Adam (a potential love interest) also suffer repercussions as he keeps his situation a secret. Kimmie is half Korean (her other half is unspecified) and Adam is Italian American; Mateo feels disconnected from them, less American, and with worries they can’t understand. He talks himself out of choosing a safer course of action, a decision that deepens the story. Mateo’s self-awareness and inner monologue at times make him seem older than 16, and, with significant turmoil in the main plot, some side elements feel underdeveloped. Aleman’s narrative joins the ranks of heart-wrenching stories of migrant families who have been separated.
An ode to the children of migrants who have been taken away. (Fiction. 14-18)Pub Date: May 4, 2021
ISBN: 978-0-7595-5605-8
Page Count: 400
Publisher: Little, Brown
Review Posted Online: Feb. 22, 2021
Kirkus Reviews Issue: March 15, 2021
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