Quasi-supernatural murder mystery? Sexy teen noir? Boarding school bildungsroman? This mess of a novel doesn’t know what it...
A quirky teen sharpens her sleuthing skills and endures boarding school drama as she attempts to solve mysteries old and new.
Cally’s sister Clare disappeared from the grounds of swanky St. Bede’s Academy 10 years ago, and now, for reasons even she can’t articulate, Cally has chosen to attend the prestigious boarding school herself. Arriving on campus midyear as a scholarship student, Cally struggles to fit in with her super-privileged classmates, who regularly flout administration rules—sneaking out after last bed-check for sex, drugs and rock ’n’ roll—but adhere to a strict, self-created code that seems random at best. Cally quickly becomes obsessed with the disappearance of her roommate Helen’s previous roommate, Iris Liang. When Helen, Cally and several other friends discover Iris’ decomposing corpse in a cave in the creepy woods off campus, paranoia and rumors grip the school, rendering St. Bedes’ typically hothouse atmosphere claustrophobic. Could Iris’ death be connected with Clare’s? How utterly unexpected! Meanwhile, Cally’s eventful love life—she’s caught between Big Man on Campus Alex and brooding, witty Jack—threatens to crowd out her attempts to resolve the girls’ mysterious disappearances. Exposition-heavy and packed with credulity-straining coincidences and red herrings, the plot lumbers unsatisfyingly toward resolution.
Quasi-supernatural murder mystery? Sexy teen noir? Boarding school bildungsroman? This mess of a novel doesn’t know what it wants to be . (Mystery. 14-17)Pub Date: July 10, 2012
ISBN: 978-0-375-86943-3
Page Count: 336
Publisher: Schwartz & Wade/Random
Review Posted Online: May 29, 2012
Kirkus Reviews Issue: June 15, 2012
BOOK REVIEW
The adventure, possibility, and closure that wrap up the mystery-driven, music-fueled Exile series will leave fans satisfied...
Dangerheart band manager Summer has just revealed a secret to Caleb, her boyfriend and the band’s lead singer, that turns his world inside out; once again, there is a twist regarding the presumed-to-be-dead rock star Eli White, who is also father to Caleb and Dangerheart bassist Val.
The band faces major fallout after traveling across the country on a tour that was set up, in part, as a scavenger hunt to find the recordings of Eli’s missing songs before the record label Candy Shell can find them and claim ownership. Angry parents, band turmoil, and pushy music executives abound upon their return. It is in this chaos that new information surfaces about the potential whereabouts of Eli White’s third hidden song…and perhaps even the man himself. This prompts Summer, Caleb, and Val to take matters into their own hands, traveling to London to secure answers to the questions they’ve been chasing. The drama that propels this trilogy closer is more mature than the previous novels’. Rather than teen romance and band squabbles, the characters now find themselves treading the murky waters of family, forgiveness, and self-trust as their high school lives come to a close.
The adventure, possibility, and closure that wrap up the mystery-driven, music-fueled Exile series will leave fans satisfied and hopeful. (Fiction. 14-17)Pub Date: Aug. 2, 2016
ISBN: 978-0-06-213401-1
Page Count: 240
Publisher: Katherine Tegen/HarperCollins
Review Posted Online: May 13, 2016
Kirkus Reviews Issue: June 1, 2016
It’s hard to get invested in a love story when one of the partners is an unknowable black hole
Two teens are set on a collision course with sexy results.
Nicolette Holland is on the run. She’s changed her name and her hair and fully intends to disappear as fast as possible. Jack Manx, son of a mob big shot, is blackmailed into finding Nicolette and making sure no one else does. The circumstances revolving around Nicolette’s importance are a bit blurry: Jack is told she murdered a girl connected to a powerful crime boss, but Nicolette doesn’t act like a murderer, and the police aren’t on her tail. The story unfolds with alternating chapters switching between Jack’s and Nicolette’s present-tense accounts, but the different perspectives offer little to the narrative. There are no tense cat-and-mouse sequences here; Jack just finds his mark with little trouble. When the pair cross paths there’s a sexual attraction that promises to give emotional texture to the mob drama, but each character is so guarded that little genuine heat arises. Jack and Nicolette are manic in their moods, going from loving to hating and back to loving each other, sometimes within the span of one or two pages. Neither character is particularly engaging: Jack is a stereotypical bad boy with a heart of gold, and the mysterious nature of Nicolette’s past crime keeps her at arm’s length.
It’s hard to get invested in a love story when one of the partners is an unknowable black hole . (Thriller. 14-16)Pub Date: June 14, 2016
ISBN: 978-1-4814-4393-7
Page Count: 416
Publisher: Simon Pulse/Simon & Schuster
Review Posted Online: May 3, 2016
Kirkus Reviews Issue: May 15, 2016
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