TIA LUGO SPEAKS NO EVIL

A girl witnesses a terrible crime in this upper–middle-grade thriller.

Thirteen-year-old Tia Lugo is ready for the summer and to go on a much-anticipated stay at sleepaway camp trip. But on the eve of her departure Tia wakes up with an asthma attack and, when reaching for her inhaler, becomes the only eyewitness to a murder just outside her window—and the killer looks right back at her. Terrified for her life since the killer knows where she lives, Tia keeps it all a secret bottled inside. As the guilt over her silence and the fear eat at her, Tia finds support in her best friend, Julius, and in her loving grandmother’s weird and embarrassing mystical beliefs. A trip to the eerie botanica where Gram shops for her curandera supplies gives Tia much-needed relief, but threatening text messages from the killer show her the danger she is really in. The novel weaves together a lot of different threads in a short span of time in addition to Tia’s terrifying ordeal and mounting fear of the killer. Apart from one unconvincing subplot when another boy shows an interest in Tia with unexpected consequences, the story is peppered with enriching, thoughtful touches like Tia’s father’s difficult relationship with Gram’s beliefs, Tia’s romantic interest in Julius, and a range of complex neighborhood dynamics with other kids. Tia and her family are Puerto Rican, and Julius has brown skin.

A slightly uneven but overall convincing thriller.