A flashy but sometimes grating novel about teenage angst and mental health.
A teenage arsonist sets her world on fire in McKee’s latest YA novel.
Heat Agaki, track star senior at Sky-Bound Private High School, hates her parents (Mr. Author and Mrs. Publisher) and all the other “lickspittles” that surround her. Her lone friend is Sarah Smith, who encourages Heat to try harder to be pleasant and maybe find a boyfriend. The only thing Heat is interested in, though, is fire. She’s already set 20 around town. So far, she’s managed to elude detection…that is, until she burns down the house of her classmate, bookish loner Mori, who sees Heat enjoying the fire from the nearby woods. Rather than be resentful, Mori is impressed by Heat’s work. “I won’t tell anybody, Agaki,” she says. “Nobody would believe me. And we both know. That house deserved to burn.” Heat, who suffers from vivid dreams and visions related to the fires, finds a kindred spirit in Mori, who is plagued by hallucinations due to her schizophrenia. What’s more, Mori wants in on the arson. As the spree continues, and with a dogged detective hot on their trail, Heat has increasing trouble figuring out what is real and what is imaginary…and where the fire ends and Heat begins. McKee’s prose is full of voice and playful textual tricks—bolded text, italics, varied text size, and other stylizations—that imbue the story with a frantic energy. Heat’s narration is either snarkily self-aware or breathlessly dramatic, as here when she realizes Mori knows her secret: “My heart sank. Or rather. A pit opened up in my stomach, and my heart fell into it. Yeah. That’s it. My heart dropped. It felt like my tongue was being pulled back into my throat. I wanted to puke. I wanted to puke. I really, really wanted to puke.” (Each of those sentences is its own paragraph.) The author does not ground the story in a recognizable reality. As a result, the more surreal elements don’t pack as much of a punch as they should.
A flashy but sometimes grating novel about teenage angst and mental health.Pub Date: June 4, 2024
ISBN: 9798891322530
Page Count: 254
Publisher: Atmosphere Press
Review Posted Online: May 29, 2024
Review Program: Kirkus Indie
BOOK REVIEW
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
This grittily provocative debut explores the horrors of self-harm and the healing power of artistic expression.
After surviving a suicide attempt, a fragile teen isn't sure she can endure without cutting herself.
Seventeen-year-old Charlie Davis, a white girl living on the margins, thinks she has little reason to live: her father drowned himself; her bereft and abusive mother kicked her out; her best friend, Ellis, is nearly brain dead after cutting too deeply; and she's gone through unspeakable experiences living on the street. After spending time in treatment with other young women like her—who cut, burn, poke, and otherwise hurt themselves—Charlie is released and takes a bus from the Twin Cities to Tucson to be closer to Mikey, a boy she "like-likes" but who had pined for Ellis instead. But things don't go as planned in the Arizona desert, because sweet Mikey just wants to be friends. Feeling rejected, Charlie, an artist, is drawn into a destructive new relationship with her sexy older co-worker, a "semifamous" local musician who's obviously a junkie alcoholic. Through intense, diarylike chapters chronicling Charlie's journey, the author captures the brutal and heartbreaking way "girls who write their pain on their bodies" scar and mar themselves, either succumbing or surviving. Like most issue books, this is not an easy read, but it's poignant and transcendent as Charlie breaks more and more before piecing herself back together.
This grittily provocative debut explores the horrors of self-harm and the healing power of artistic expression. (author’s note) (Fiction. 14 & up)Pub Date: Aug. 30, 2016
ISBN: 978-1-101-93471-5
Page Count: 416
Publisher: Delacorte
Review Posted Online: May 3, 2016
Kirkus Reviews Issue: May 15, 2016
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