Less thriller than psychological puzzler, this novel effectively keep readers guessing.
Held hostage by a terrorist group somewhere in Europe, Chloe finds herself increasingly attracted to her captor as her mother and friends back home do everything they can to free her.
Chloe was working in Greece over the summer and is known for how carefully she manages her life. When she is kidnapped on the side of a road, she is really out of control and frightened. Blindfolded and drugged, Chloe gradually realizes that she is being held as a trade for the release of prisoners whom her captor believes to have been unjustly prosecuted. Her main relationship is with one man who is gentle and kind and eventually becomes her lover. Chapters written by Chloe after the fact detail events and alternate with notes, letters, e-mail messages, news reports, Facebook posts and webpages. It is in these interpolations that readers see how Chloe's advocates manipulate facts themselves in order to effect her rescue. At the end, psychologists put her words in the context of how others have responded, challenging her veracity. This eminently discussable novel continually asks readers to consider whether ends justify means and how power and control affect relationships. They take the journey with Chloe through paralyzing fear toward what seems like love. Is it?
Less thriller than psychological puzzler, this novel effectively keep readers guessing. (Suspense. 12 & up)Pub Date: Nov. 1, 2011
ISBN: 978-1-55451-283-6
Page Count: 248
Publisher: Annick Press
Review Posted Online: Sept. 13, 2011
Kirkus Reviews Issue: Oct. 1, 2011
A good bet for fans of superhero fiction and graphic novels and readers in search of superpowered female warriors.
This near-future dystopia starring an Apache female superhero has the soul of a graphic novel, if not the art.
Like her famous Chiracahua ancestor, Lozen too is a warrior, but unlike her namesake, it’s by coercion. Her masters are four semihuman rulers of Haven, a walled fortress in what was once Arizona. Much of humanity perished when the Cloud, a mysterious force that’s rendered human technology useless, arrived from beyond Jupiter. Although their bio-enhancements no longer work, the despotic overlords that survive rule. Holding Lozen’s family as hostages, Haven’s rulers send her out to battle gemods, genetically modified monsters left over from pre-C days. Lozen complies while working toward her family’s escape. On each trip, she caches supplies, food, weapons. Allies—natural and supernatural, known and hidden, at Haven and in the wild—offer guidance but not rescue. For that, Lozen must rely on her wits, tracking skills and weaponry (guns have survived the Cloud), drawing strength from her warrior heritage to dispatch monstrous birds of prey, a giant anaconda and more (the cartoonish tone helps mute the graphic violence). Lozen’s tactics and weaponry are detailed at length but within a cultural framework that fosters respect for the planet and its surviving natural inhabitants.
A good bet for fans of superhero fiction and graphic novels and readers in search of superpowered female warriors. (Fantasy. 12 & up)Pub Date: Oct. 1, 2013
ISBN: 978-1-62014-143-4
Page Count: 400
Publisher: Tu Books
Review Posted Online: Aug. 20, 2013
Kirkus Reviews Issue: Sept. 15, 2013
Aza would claim that opinions about this book are unfairly influenced by “the gut-brain informational cycle,” which makes it...
Nerdfighter Green’s latest takes readers through Indianapolis and the human biome.
Aza Holmes doesn’t feel like herself. But “if half the cells inside of you are not you, doesn’t that challenge the whole notion of me as a singular pronoun…?” When a local billionaire—and the father of her childhood friend, a white boy named Davis—disappears, Aza (who seems to be white) and her BFF, Daisy Ramirez (who is cued as Latina), plot to find him and claim the reward, amid rumors of corruption and an underexplored side plot about semi-immortal reptiles. The story revolves around anxious Aza’s dissociation from her body and life. Daisy chatters about Star Wars fan fiction (and calls Aza “Holmesy” ad nauseam), and Davis monologues about astronomy, while Aza obsesses over infection, the ever present, self-inflicted wound on her finger, and whether she’s “just a deeply flawed line of reasoning.” The thin but neatly constructed plot feels a bit like an excuse for Green to flex his philosophical muscles; teenagers questioning the mysteries of consciousness can identify with Aza, while others might wish that something—anything—really happens. The exploration of Aza’s life-threatening compulsions will resonate deeply with some, titillate others, and possibly trigger those in between.
Aza would claim that opinions about this book are unfairly influenced by “the gut-brain informational cycle,” which makes it hard to say what anyone else will think—but this is the new John Green; people will read this, or not, regardless of someone else’s gut flora. (Fiction. 14-18)Pub Date: Oct. 10, 2017
ISBN: 978-0-525-55536-0
Page Count: 304
Publisher: Dutton
Review Posted Online: Oct. 9, 2017
Kirkus Reviews Issue: Oct. 15, 2017
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