An emotionally honest and captivating story about grief, family, and the stories we tell in this digital age.
In Tourtelot’s novel, when a teenager’s grief over her best friend’s sudden death collides with her mother’s curated online persona, a family begins to unravel.
Told through the dual perspectives of Indie, a sharp and wounded teenager, and her mother, Kate, a real estate agent and lifestyle blogger, this novel explores themes of loss, belief, and the shifting ground of identity. The story opens with Kate driving frantically along the Taconic State Parkway, fearing for her missing daughter, Indie. From there, the narrative rewinds to the months following the sudden death of Indie’s best friend, Maddy, a loss that shatters Indie’s sense of safety and belonging. Indie’s grief takes the form of withdrawal and obsessive searching—into conspiracy theories, online gurus, and altered states of consciousness—as she struggles to make sense of life after Maddy. Meanwhile, Kate tries to hold her family together. She writes curated, witty posts for her online column (“And that’s how the sausage is made, folks”), projecting control and confidence to her readers while privately unraveling. Her marriage to Ethan deteriorates under the weight of unspoken resentments, while her connection to Indie falters as she fails to bridge the gap between her daughter’s anguish and her own pragmatism. As Indie flirts with dangerous influences online and in person, Kate confronts her own illusions about family, community, and marriage. By weaving together the mother’s and daughter’s perspectives, Tourtelot captures both the rawness of grief and the barriers to communication across generations. The author excels at rendering the textures of small-town life, the absurdities of online performance, and the interior chaos of grief. The dual points of view and inclusion of blog posts, text messages, and other forms of media add richness to the text. Indie’s chapters feel raw and vulnerable, much like her teenage self; Kate’s chapters can at times feel overly polished, but this reflects the online persona that she has carefully manufactured. The pacing occasionally meanders when Indie’s philosophical digressions risk growing repetitive, but the short chapters generally keep the action moving.
An emotionally honest and captivating story about grief, family, and the stories we tell in this digital age.Pub Date: Jan. 20, 2026
ISBN: 9798896360483
Page Count: 256
Publisher: She Writes Press
Review Posted Online: Sept. 22, 2025
Kirkus Reviews Issue: Nov. 15, 2025
Review Program: Kirkus Indie
With captivating dialogue, angst-y characters, and a couple of steamy sex scenes, Hoover has done it again.
After being released from prison, a young woman tries to reconnect with her 5-year-old daughter despite having killed the girl’s father.
Kenna didn’t even know she was pregnant until after she was sent to prison for murdering her boyfriend, Scotty. When her baby girl, Diem, was born, she was forced to give custody to Scotty’s parents. Now that she’s been released, Kenna is intent on getting to know her daughter, but Scotty’s parents won’t give her a chance to tell them what really happened the night their son died. Instead, they file a restraining order preventing Kenna from so much as introducing herself to Diem. Handsome, self-assured Ledger, who was Scotty’s best friend, is another key adult in Diem’s life. He’s helping her grandparents raise her, and he too blames Kenna for Scotty’s death. Even so, there’s something about her that haunts him. Kenna feels the pull, too, and seems to be seeking Ledger out despite his judgmental behavior. As Ledger gets to know Kenna and acknowledges his attraction to her, he begins to wonder if maybe he and Scotty’s parents have judged her unfairly. Even so, Ledger is afraid that if he surrenders to his feelings, Scotty’s parents will kick him out of Diem’s life. As Kenna and Ledger continue to mourn for Scotty, they also grieve the future they cannot have with each other. Told alternatively from Kenna’s and Ledger’s perspectives, the story explores the myriad ways in which snap judgments based on partial information can derail people’s lives. Built on a foundation of death and grief, this story has an undercurrent of sadness. As usual, however, the author has created compelling characters who are magnetic and sympathetic enough to pull readers in. In addition to grief, the novel also deftly explores complex issues such as guilt, self-doubt, redemption, and forgiveness.
With captivating dialogue, angst-y characters, and a couple of steamy sex scenes, Hoover has done it again.Pub Date: Jan. 18, 2022
ISBN: 978-1-5420-2560-7
Page Count: 335
Publisher: Montlake Romance
Review Posted Online: Oct. 12, 2021
Kirkus Reviews Issue: Nov. 1, 2021
SEEN & HEARD
BOOK TO SCREEN
BOOK TO SCREEN
A boarding-school fantasia, with Hilderbrand’s signature upgrades to the cuisine and decor. Sign us up for next term.
A year in the life of the No. 2 boarding school in America—up from No. 19 last year!
Rumors of Hilderbrand’s retirement were greatly exaggerated, it turns out, since not only has she not gone out to pasture, she’s started over in high school, with her daughter Shelby Cunningham as co-author. As their delicious new book opens, it’s Move-In Day at Tiffin Academy, and Head of School Audre Robinson is warmly welcoming the returning and new students to the New England campus, the latter group including a rare midstream addition to the junior class. Brainiac Charley Hicks is transferring from public school in Maryland to a spot that opened up when one of the school’s most beloved students died by suicide the preceding year. She will be joining a large, diverse cast of adult and teenage characters—queen bees, jealous second-stringers, boozehounds young and old, secret lesbians, people chasing the wrong people chasing other wrong people—all of them royally screwed when an app called Zip Zap appears and starts blasting everyone’s secrets all over campus. How the heck…? Meanwhile, it seems so unlikely that Tiffin has jumped up to the No. 2 spot in the boarding-school rankings that a high-profile magazine launches an investigation, and even the head is worried that there may have been payola involved. The school has a reputation for being more social than academic, and this quality gets an exciting new exclamation point when the resident millionaire bad boy opens a high-style secret speakeasy for select juniors in a forgotten basement. It’s called Priorities. Exactly. One problem: Cinnamon Peters’ mysterious suicide hangs over the book in an odd way, especially since the note she left for her closest male friend is not to be opened for another year—and isn’t. This is surely a setup for a sequel, but it’s a bit frustrating here, and bobs sort of shallowly along amid the general high spirits.
A boarding-school fantasia, with Hilderbrand’s signature upgrades to the cuisine and decor. Sign us up for next term.Pub Date: Sept. 16, 2025
ISBN: 9780316567855
Page Count: 432
Publisher: Little, Brown
Review Posted Online: July 4, 2025
Kirkus Reviews Issue: Aug. 1, 2025
SEEN & HEARD
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