A powerful thriller that will surprise you at every turn.
A sensitive treatment of high school shootings and their impact on families of both perpetrators and victims.
Sixteen-year-old Skye Gilchrist is returning to her hometown three years after a deadly shooting. Her brother was one of the perpetrators, killed by police during the incident. In the subsequent fallout, her father abandoned the family, she and her mother left town to live with her grandmother, and her mother spiraled into depression. Moving home to live with her aunt and attend high school with classmates who were affected by her brother’s actions is hard, especially since her former best friend and crush, Jesse Mandal, lost his brother, Jamil, in the shooting and isn’t quite sure how to deal with Skye’s reappearance. Shunned by peers and anonymously bullied online and in cruel pranks, Skye’s concerns are dismissed by the grown-ups around her as attention-seeking. Jesse, a Bangladeshi-American Muslim boy, has his own challenges as he also tries to avoid school bullies and overperforms in an attempt to comfort his parents and compensate for Jamil’s death. Armstrong paints a refreshingly authentic and touching portrait of Jesse and his family as they deal with their grief. Alternating first-person accounts by Jesse and Skye build a compelling plot and well-developed characters. Skye and her family are white.
A powerful thriller that will surprise you at every turn. (Thriller. 12-18)Pub Date: May 22, 2018
ISBN: 978-0-399-55036-2
Page Count: 384
Publisher: Crown
Review Posted Online: March 4, 2018
Kirkus Reviews Issue: March 15, 2018
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
Exactly what the title promises.
A grieving teen’s devotion to romance films might ruin her chances at actual romance.
Liz Buxbaum has always adored rom-coms, not least for helping her still feel close to her screenwriter mother, who died when she was little. Liz hopes that her senior year might turn into a real-life romantic fantasy, as an old crush has moved back to town, cuter and nicer than ever. Surely she can get Michael to ask her to prom. If only Wes, the annoying boy next door, would help her with her scheming! This charming, fluffy concoction manages to pack into one goofy plot every conceivable trope, from fake dating to the makeover to the big misunderstanding. Creative, quirky, daydreaming Liz is just shy of an annoying stereotype, saved by a dry wit and unresolved grief and anger. Wes makes for a delightful bad boy with a good heart, and supporting characters—including a sassy best friend, a perfect popular rival, even a (not really) evil stepmother—all get the opportunity to transcend their roles. The only villain here is Liz’s lovelorn imagination, provoking her into foolish lies that cause actual hurt feelings; but she is sufficiently self-aware to make amends just in time for the most important trope of all: a blissfully happy ending. All characters seem to be White by default.
Exactly what the title promises. (Romance. 12-18)Pub Date: May 4, 2021
ISBN: 978-1-5344-6762-0
Page Count: 368
Publisher: Simon & Schuster
Review Posted Online: Feb. 22, 2021
Kirkus Reviews Issue: March 15, 2021
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