Raw and authentic.
A 17-year-old girl is forced to grow in unexpected ways.
Alexis Duncan dreams of making it out of her rough West Philadelphia neighborhood. With her father out of the picture, a mother with drug abuse issues, and friends who seem to be heading in a direction she's not comfortable with, Lex depends on her basketball skills to escape. Those dreams are shattered after an incident at a party leaves her seriously injured. Lost in despair, Lex blows up at Aamani Chakrabarti, the new girl whose family bought a local convenience store—but Aamani convinces Lex to join the school’s STEM team. An average student, Lex has to put in tremendous effort to keep up, and the pair grow closer the more time they spend studying together, making Lex question her sexuality. Just as her new life is looking up, intrusions from her old life threaten to undo the great strides she’s made, forcing her to make momentous decisions. The author admirably weaves the two girls’ intersecting identities into the story, endearing them to readers and offering insights into the complex forces that shaped them. Lex is Black, bisexual, poor, and disabled; lesbian Aamani is Indian American from a Hindu family. Minor characters are also well developed. The author doesn’t shy away from showing truths about how poverty affects people, especially in Black communities. Excessive pop-culture references unfortunately take readers out of the moment.
Raw and authentic. (author’s note) (Fiction. 14-18)Pub Date: March 1, 2022
ISBN: 978-1-63583-074-3
Page Count: 400
Publisher: Flux
Review Posted Online: Dec. 23, 2021
Kirkus Reviews Issue: Jan. 15, 2022
This story is necessary. This story is important.
Sixteen-year-old Starr Carter is a black girl and an expert at navigating the two worlds she exists in: one at Garden Heights, her black neighborhood, and the other at Williamson Prep, her suburban, mostly white high school.
Walking the line between the two becomes immensely harder when Starr is present at the fatal shooting of her childhood best friend, Khalil, by a white police officer. Khalil was unarmed. Khalil’s death becomes national news, where he’s called a thug and possible drug dealer and gangbanger. His death becomes justified in the eyes of many, including one of Starr’s best friends at school. The police’s lackadaisical attitude sparks anger and then protests in the community, turning it into a war zone. Questions remain about what happened in the moments leading to Khalil’s death, and the only witness is Starr, who must now decide what to say or do, if anything. Thomas cuts to the heart of the matter for Starr and for so many like her, laying bare the systemic racism that undergirds her world, and she does so honestly and inescapably, balancing heartbreak and humor. With smooth but powerful prose delivered in Starr’s natural, emphatic voice, finely nuanced characters, and intricate and realistic relationship dynamics, this novel will have readers rooting for Starr and opening their hearts to her friends and family.
This story is necessary. This story is important. (Fiction. 14-adult)Pub Date: Feb. 28, 2017
ISBN: 978-0-06-249853-3
Page Count: 464
Publisher: Balzer + Bray/HarperCollins
Review Posted Online: Dec. 5, 2016
Kirkus Reviews Issue: Dec. 15, 2016
BOOK REVIEW
BOOK REVIEW
BOOK REVIEW
SEEN & HEARD
SEEN & HEARD
SEEN & HEARD
A solid sophomore novel celebrating love that begs for a soundtrack.
Queer Black girls fall in love at a summer music festival.
When dating the top basketball recruit in Indiana turns disastrous, ruining her socially, emotionally, and in her mother’s eyes, perpetually in love 16-year-old Olivia Brooks begs her best friend, Imani Garrett, to take a summer road trip to the Farmland Arts and Music Festival in Georgia. Imani agrees on one condition: Olivia cannot hook up with anyone on the trip. Meanwhile, Toni Jackson is heading to Farmland for the first time without her musician-turned-roadie dad, who was killed 8 months ago. Joined by her best friend, Peter Menon (whose surname cues him as Indian), Toni is trying to figure her life out—college or something else? She believes that if she performs in the festival’s Golden Apple amateur competition, the truth will become clear. The four meet in Georgia, and when all the solo slots in the competition are full, Toni and Olivia agree to enter as a duo and help each other with their individual quests—Toni’s to perform on stage, Olivia’s to be distracted from the upcoming judicial hearing over violating behavior by her ex-boyfriend and to win the prize of a much-needed car. Although Imani and Peter feel more like devices than well-developed characters with substantial relationships to the protagonists, the exploration of Olivia’s tendency to adapt to others’ expectations of her is wonderfully nuanced, and her relationship with Toni is delightfully swoon-y.
A solid sophomore novel celebrating love that begs for a soundtrack. (Fiction. 14-18)Pub Date: July 6, 2021
ISBN: 978-1-338-66223-8
Page Count: 336
Publisher: Scholastic
Review Posted Online: May 10, 2021
Kirkus Reviews Issue: June 1, 2021
BOOK REVIEW
BOOK REVIEW
BOOK REVIEW
PROFILES
SEEN & HEARD
SEEN & HEARD
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