A raw, beautiful account of moving forward after your world is reshaped by loss.
Before Alissa walked into the river, she gave her beloved copies of the Children of Hypnos book series to her best friend.
Between her autism and her fury at Alissa for the suicide, Evie knows she’s not expressing grief in the ways everyone around her expects. Only Alissa’s brother, Ash, seems to understand what Evie needs. He doesn’t mind that she’s skipping track practices and checking out at school. When Ash talks to her about Alissa’s favorite game, the media tie-in Children of Hypnos Online, Evie decides to give it a try. “I get to be somewhere else. I get to be someone else,” Ash says, and to grieving Evie, that sounds perfect. Yet Evie is still very much herself when she plays CoH: studious, determined, and competitive as hell. Classwork and track can wait, because Evie cares only about going on raids with a high-level CoH clan. Between gaming with Ash and sharing his weed gummies, plus their developing romance, Evie’s got all she needs in this post-Alissa world where nothing matters anyway. She rapidly becomes a star player, and Zappia’s illustrations of the CoH characters help make the players’ online world feel real. Evie’s disassociation and carefully cultivated apathy ring painfully true as she recovers from being left behind, coping with a senseless world by burying herself in the video game. Evie, Ash, and Alissa present white.
A raw, beautiful account of moving forward after your world is reshaped by loss. (content note, character gallery) (Fiction. 14-18)Pub Date: July 28, 2026
ISBN: 9780063451483
Page Count: 304
Publisher: Greenwillow Books
Review Posted Online: April 20, 2026
Kirkus Reviews Issue: May 15, 2026
An ode to the children of migrants who have been taken away.
A Mexican American boy takes on heavy responsibilities when his family is torn apart.
Mateo’s life is turned upside down the day U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement agents show up unsuccessfully seeking his Pa at his New York City bodega. The Garcias live in fear until the day both parents are picked up; his Pa is taken to jail and his Ma to a detention center. The adults around Mateo offer support to him and his 7-year-old sister, Sophie, however, he knows he is now responsible for caring for her and the bodega as well as trying to survive junior year—that is, if he wants to fulfill his dream to enter the drama program at the Tisch School of the Arts and become an actor. Mateo’s relationships with his friends Kimmie and Adam (a potential love interest) also suffer repercussions as he keeps his situation a secret. Kimmie is half Korean (her other half is unspecified) and Adam is Italian American; Mateo feels disconnected from them, less American, and with worries they can’t understand. He talks himself out of choosing a safer course of action, a decision that deepens the story. Mateo’s self-awareness and inner monologue at times make him seem older than 16, and, with significant turmoil in the main plot, some side elements feel underdeveloped. Aleman’s narrative joins the ranks of heart-wrenching stories of migrant families who have been separated.
An ode to the children of migrants who have been taken away. (Fiction. 14-18)Pub Date: May 4, 2021
ISBN: 978-0-7595-5605-8
Page Count: 400
Publisher: Little, Brown
Review Posted Online: Feb. 22, 2021
Kirkus Reviews Issue: March 15, 2021
BOOK REVIEW
BOOK REVIEW
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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