Best friends Raven, Sydney, Kelly and Alexia are close, but nothing brings a friendship closer than commiserating over a breakup. In this romantic dramedy, Raven, Sydney and Kelly all break up with their boyfriends, leading boyfriendless Alexia to help them devise a set of rules for surviving breakups. The rules, which include Do Not think about your past with The Ex and You must not write The Ex letters or text messages saying you miss him, seem easy enough to follow in the solitude of Alexia’s living room. In the real world of high school, however, the rules seem to cause nothing but trouble. Sydney’s ex might be interested in Kelly. Alexia feels as though she’s betraying her friends because she’s falling for Kelly’s ex’s brother. Raven’s crush wants her to sing in his garage band, an idea to which her mother is vehemently opposed. Somehow, the girls have to figure out a way to balance the rules with what their hearts desire. The busy story line is sometimes difficult to follow because each chapter features a different girl. Chick-lit readers will be drawn to the premise and the pink on the cover, but they may find the descriptions clunky, the characters indistinguishable from one another, and the writing not as lighthearted or breezy as the flap copy promises. (Fiction. YA)
Pub Date: Dec. 1, 2007
ISBN: 978-0-439-02691-8
Page Count: 304
Publisher: Point/Scholastic
Review Posted Online: May 19, 2010
Kirkus Reviews Issue: Nov. 15, 2007
BOOK REVIEW
An interesting premise unevenly executed.
Eighteen-year-old Venus Stoneheart is a witcher with a pain-filled past and an uncertain future.
In an alternate version of the greater Washington, D.C., metro area, Venus’ mother, the formidable Clarissa Stoneheart, used to be the Love Witcher. She broke her pledge to only brew love potions, lost her magic as a consequence, and then turned her attention to teaching Venus, the new Love Witcher, “her 3-B philosophy…Get your bag, brew, and bounce.” When Clarissa is murdered, Venus is tested to her limits as she fights external forces by using her calling (her magical ability to brew) for political gain while also struggling to quiet the deviation (or trauma-inflicted corruption of her calling) that infects her. The deviation, which she calls It, can give Venus access to immense power, but she’s still haunted, in more ways than she realizes, by the first time it was uncaged, when she was 15. The buildup to action takes some time, and the plot can be confusing to follow, given the digressions to explain the worldbuilding. Characters are alternately centered, pushed to the periphery, and then brought into focus again, seemingly in service of filling plot gaps but without necessarily moving the story forward. Patient readers will eventually encounter unexpected twists and turns that provide an exciting and satisfying ending. Recipes for potions readers can brew themselves deepen the pull into this witchery world.
An interesting premise unevenly executed. (content warning, author’s note, glossary) (Fantasy. 15-18)Pub Date: March 5, 2024
ISBN: 9781728251950
Page Count: 496
Publisher: Sourcebooks Fire
Review Posted Online: Dec. 6, 2023
Kirkus Reviews Issue: Jan. 1, 2024
An immersive, compassionate tale about coming-of-age in a single night.
Tegan’s world was unraveling before Mac stumbled into the museum; tonight could change everything.
Tegan misses her father and disdains her mother, now happy with her live-in partner, Charlie. After a fight with her mom, Tegan’s taken refuge after hours at the Thomas Edison Center, where she’s been an intern. Born with just a thumb and ring finger on her left hand and perennially hyperaware of her appearance, she’s shocked and embarrassed when Mac, a classmate and popular jock, arrives—his hand bleeding—and asks her to call 911 to report a potential suicide. Tegan complies, then tends to his wound. She’s been crying and ran outside in old clothes but recognizes Mac is frazzled, too. At a loss, she gives him a museum tour. Over the long, snowy night, they connect. Mac’s trusting willingness to share difficult life events disarms Tegan, awakening a yearning to share her own, more toxic secret despite the risk. Despite unnecessarily schematic plotting (key information is initially withheld), the story and characters will sustain reader interest. Emmich captures the excruciating self-consciousness and lacerating self-talk of adolescence, magnified and relentlessly scrutinized through social media and here exacerbated by Tegan’s limb difference and fractured family. Tegan’s struggles to reconcile her longing both for invisibility and to be seen and understood are compelling, familiar, and moving. Most characters are presumed White; Charlie is Black, and Tegan’s best friend is Indian American.
An immersive, compassionate tale about coming-of-age in a single night. (Fiction. 14-18)Pub Date: Sept. 21, 2021
ISBN: 978-0-316-53570-0
Page Count: 320
Publisher: Poppy/Little, Brown
Review Posted Online: July 7, 2021
Kirkus Reviews Issue: Aug. 1, 2021
BOOK REVIEW
BOOK REVIEW
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