A sweet summer romance with two funny, compelling protagonists.
This YA spinoff of Roberts’ (The Replacement Crush, 2016, etc.) previous novel follows a timid bookworm and a hunky surfer.
Amy McIntyre is determined to win a social media contest that will garner her a personal interview with Lucinda Amorrato, a bestselling romance author who is beloved by many but hasn’t toured in years. Unfortunately, Amy’s first stunt, a public “yarn-bombing” replicating her favorite book cover, attracts the attention of the Shady Cove police, who bust the teenager for breaking curfew. Enter Toff Nichols—champion surfer, known player, and soon-to-be stepbrother of Amy’s best friend, Vivian Galdi (the heroine of The Replacement Crush). He happens to catch Amy in the act and pretends to be her boyfriend to get her out of trouble. Soon Toff offers to coach Amy, upping her self-confidence to gain more likes and shares and get the attention of Amorrato’s publisher, which is running the contest. When a photograph of Toff and Amy goes viral and romance fans start “shipping” them (a fandom term describing two characters who should get together), she begins to see real relationship potential in the boy she once thought was out of her league. Meanwhile, Toff starts to appreciate Amy’s penchant for sparkly hair ornaments, enthusiasm for reading, and fiery spirit that matches her wild red hair. But after the two engage in more than one make-out session, they have to face reality: Can a surfer who doesn’t read and a romance-novel fanatic really make it work? Roberts has the teen voice down pat: Both of the appealing protagonists are devoted to their respective passions but also deal with deeper issues (Amy’s pastry chef father is now unemployed, and Toff’s surfer dad is about to marry Vivian’s mother). Amy’s knowledge of romance novels and her excitement for the contest are both contagious, and her friends Vivian and Dallas are close by and ready to help her achieve her goal. This engaging love story with a strong cast will make even the most jaded reader hope for a happily-ever-after.
A sweet summer romance with two funny, compelling protagonists.Pub Date: Oct. 29, 2019
ISBN: 978-1-64063-707-8
Page Count: 400
Publisher: Entangled Teen
Review Posted Online: Oct. 18, 2019
Kirkus Reviews Issue: Jan. 1, 2020
Review Program: Kirkus Indie
BOOK REVIEW
BOOK REVIEW
An eighth grader discovers five schoolmates with psychic powers in this amateurish effort from Lubar. Martin, who was expelled from every other junior high in six counties for mouthing off, is consigned to prison-like Edgeview Alternative School, along with other violent or nerdy teens deemed hopeless misfits. While trying to avoid both the ready fists of hulking bully Lester Bloodbath and the shock therapy meted out by Principal Davis, he meets Torchy, who can start fires without matches or lighters, Cheater Woo, whose test answers are always identical to someone else’s, and several others with odd, unconscious talents. Interspersing Martin’s tediously self-analytical narrative with flat attempts at humor, trite student essays, repetitive memos to faculty, and mawkish letters from home, Lugar draws the tale to a paradoxical climax in which the self-styled “psi five” scuttle Bloodbath’s plot to close the school down, but then do their best to earn releases. After realizing that he is psychic, able to read people’s deepest fears and hopes, Martin abruptly acquires a sense of responsibility and resolves never to abuse his talent. Padded with aimless subplots and earnest efforts to drum up sympathy for the one-dimensional cast’s brutal bullies and ineffectual teachers, this contrived story is a weak alternative to Stephanie Tolan’s Welcome to the Ark (1996) or Willo Davis Roberts’s The Girl with the Silver Eyes (1980). (Fiction. 12-15)
Pub Date: June 1, 1999
ISBN: 0-312-86646-1
Page Count: 213
Publisher: Tor
Review Posted Online: May 19, 2010
Kirkus Reviews Issue: May 1, 1999
BOOK REVIEW
BOOK REVIEW
BOOK REVIEW
Aspiring filmmaker/first-novelist Chbosky adds an upbeat ending to a tale of teenaged angst—the right combination of realism and uplift to allow it on high school reading lists, though some might object to the sexuality, drinking, and dope-smoking. More sophisticated readers might object to the rip-off of Salinger, though Chbosky pays homage by having his protagonist read Catcher in the Rye. Like Holden, Charlie oozes sincerity, rails against celebrity phoniness, and feels an extraliterary bond with his favorite writers (Harper Lee, Fitzgerald, Kerouac, Ayn Rand, etc.). But Charlie’s no rich kid: the third child in a middle-class family, he attends public school in western Pennsylvania, has an older brother who plays football at Penn State, and an older sister who worries about boys a lot. An epistolary novel addressed to an anonymous “friend,” Charlie’s letters cover his first year in high school, a time haunted by the recent suicide of his best friend. Always quick to shed tears, Charlie also feels guilty about the death of his Aunt Helen, a troubled woman who lived with Charlie’s family at the time of her fatal car wreck. Though he begins as a friendless observer, Charlie is soon pals with seniors Patrick and Sam (for Samantha), stepsiblings who include Charlie in their circle, where he smokes pot for the first time, drops acid, and falls madly in love with the inaccessible Sam. His first relationship ends miserably because Charlie remains compulsively honest, though he proves a loyal friend (to Patrick when he’s gay-bashed) and brother (when his sister needs an abortion). Depressed when all his friends prepare for college, Charlie has a catatonic breakdown, which resolves itself neatly and reveals a long-repressed truth about Aunt Helen. A plain-written narrative suggesting that passivity, and thinking too much, lead to confusion and anxiety. Perhaps the folks at (co-publisher) MTV see the synergy here with Daria or any number of videos by the sensitive singer-songwriters they feature.
Pub Date: Feb. 4, 1999
ISBN: 0-671-02734-4
Page Count: 256
Publisher: MTV Books/Simon & Schuster
Review Posted Online: May 19, 2010
Kirkus Reviews Issue: Jan. 15, 1999
BOOK REVIEW
SEEN & HEARD
SEEN & HEARD
SEEN & HEARD
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