A heartfelt journey through the complexities of first love, family struggles, and the resilience of youth.
Young love blossoms in 1990s Kansas in Morra’s debut YA novel.
Liv is 15 years old when her parents’ divorce uproots her from Buffalo, New York, and plops her down in rural Kansas. A trip to the neighborhood swimming hole leads to meeting Jack, a boy her age who becomes her first friend in her new town and, eventually, her boyfriend. That’s the basic premise of this 1990s-set narrative, which mostly succeeds at rising above the level of a rote tale of young love. Liv and Jack hit it off right away—his nickname for her, Sunflower, comes from the field next to the swimming hole—but finding each other ends up being the easy part. Jack soon finds out his mother is dying of cancer; once she is gone, he and his brother, Brandon, are left to contend with their mercurial father and the family’s failing farm. Jack quits high school to help on the farm, breaks up with Liv, and eventually puts the culinary skills he learned at his mother’s side to become a cook at a local restaurant. Along the way, family secrets are explored, and Jack and Liv continue to pine for each other. The author creates two compelling characters in Liv and Jack, and we root for them from the beginning. Brandon is also nicely fleshed out, though a bevy of other characters, most notably Liv’s mother, Christine, and Christine’s boyfriend, Alex, are little more than filler. Though Morra’s adult characters could use more depth, her story is filled with twists and turns that keep the action moving swiftly, and the final pages are nicely written and extremely moving. Despite some shortcomings, the novel ably captures the essence of first love (“I immediately notice his eyes, intensely blue; they sparkle with his excitement like a lightning storm, and when he listens, they glow with calm, like a pristine lagoon. They draw me in, making it hard not to stare into them”) and the pains of growing up.
A heartfelt journey through the complexities of first love, family struggles, and the resilience of youth.Pub Date: N/A
ISBN: N/A
Page Count: 166
Publisher: FriesenPress
Review Posted Online: Dec. 18, 2023
Review Program: Kirkus Indie
A troubling depiction of an unhealthy relationship.
A battered girl and an injured rugby star spark up an ill-advised romance at an Irish secondary school.
Beautiful, waiflike, 15-year-old Shannon has lived her entire life in Ballylaggin. Alternately bullied at school and beaten by her ne’er-do-well father, she’s hopeful for a fresh start at Tommen, a private school. Seventeen-year-old Johnny, who has a hair-trigger temper and a severe groin injury, is used to Dublin’s elite-level rugby but, since his family’s move to County Cork, is now stuck captaining Tommen’s middling team. When Johnny angrily kicks a ball and knocks Shannon unconscious (“a soft female groan came from her lips”), a tentative relationship is born. As the two grow closer, Johnny’s past and Shannon’s present become serious obstacles to their budding love, threatening Shannon’s safety. Shannon’s portrayal feels infantilized (“I looked down at the tiny little female under my arm”), while Johnny comes across as borderline obsessive (“I knew I shouldn’t be touching her, but how the hell could I not?”). Uneven pacing and choppy sentences lead to a sudden climax and an unsatisfyingly abrupt ending. Repetitive descriptions, abundant and misogynistic dialogue (Johnny, to his best friend: “who’s the bitch with a vagina now?”), and graphic violence also weigh down this lengthy tome (considerably trimmed down from its original, self-published length). The cast of lively, well-developed supporting characters, especially Johnny’s best friend and Shannon’s protective older brother, is a bright spot. Major characters read white.
A troubling depiction of an unhealthy relationship. (author’s note, pronunciations, glossary, song moments, playlists) (Romance. 16-18)Pub Date: Nov. 28, 2023
ISBN: 9781728299945
Page Count: 626
Publisher: Bloom Books
Review Posted Online: Oct. 21, 2023
Kirkus Reviews Issue: Nov. 15, 2023
There’s not much plot here, but readers will relish the opportunity to climb inside Autumn’s head.
The finely drawn characters capture readers’ attention in this debut.
Autumn and Phineas, nicknamed Finny, were born a week apart; their mothers are still best friends. Growing up, Autumn and Finny were like peas in a pod despite their differences: Autumn is “quirky and odd,” while Finny is “sweet and shy and everyone like[s] him.” But in eighth grade, Autumn and Finny stop being friends due to an unexpected kiss. They drift apart and find new friends, but their friendship keeps asserting itself at parties, shared holiday gatherings and random encounters. In the summer after graduation, Autumn and Finny reconnect and are finally ready to be more than friends. But on August 8, everything changes, and Autumn has to rely on all her strength to move on. Autumn’s coming-of-age is sensitively chronicled, with a wide range of experiences and events shaping her character. Even secondary characters are well-rounded, with their own histories and motivations.
There’s not much plot here, but readers will relish the opportunity to climb inside Autumn’s head. (Fiction. 14 & up)Pub Date: April 1, 2013
ISBN: 978-1-4022-7782-5
Page Count: 336
Publisher: Sourcebooks Fire
Review Posted Online: Feb. 12, 2013
Kirkus Reviews Issue: March 1, 2013
BOOK REVIEW
SEEN & HEARD
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