Strictly for fans of Miss Porter’s, Wegmans, and the Vineyard.
Two teens find healing through a senior writing project at an upscale school serving gifted youth with psychiatric disorders in Ithaca, New York.
Levon is a loner; some speculate he’s inherited Asperger’s from the father he’s never met. Recently hospitalized after a suicide attempt, Samantha remains fragile. Meg, their English teacher/therapist, instructs them to write about their lives, sharing their work with each other. Separately, she solicits written input from their families and others. These collective writings form the novel. The project makes little academic or literary sense. New essayists repeat what readers already know, rewinding the narrative to catalog academic and professional accomplishments—before marveling at Levon and Sam, who are widely admired. (Each is tall, attractive, sensitive, and gifted). Their world feels hermetically sealed: inhabited exclusively by white, privileged, good-looking, high-achieving students and adults whose possessions manifest Eurocentric good taste. The few not born to affluence have ascended to it via natural gifts. (In mind-blowing reverse-stereotyping, a professor tells Sam’s Catholic father that his intelligence and good taste prove he has Jewish blood.) The repeated emphasis on characters’ beauty, brilliance, and wealth is distancing. This effect is compounded as Sam, Levon, and their peers are admitted to Ivies and other top-tier colleges, success achieved without visible effort. (When one’s admitted to the New England Conservatory, friends are astonished to learn he plays the cello.)
Strictly for fans of Miss Porter’s, Wegmans, and the Vineyard. (Fiction. 14-17)Pub Date: Aug. 1, 2017
ISBN: 978-1-62672-688-8
Page Count: 320
Publisher: Roaring Brook Press
Review Posted Online: May 9, 2017
Kirkus Reviews Issue: June 1, 2017
Several yards short of a touchdown.
A transgender boy starting over at a new school falls hard for a popular cheerleader with a reputation to protect in this debut.
On the first day of senior year, transgender boy Pony locks eyes with cisgender cheerleader Georgia. They both have pasts they want to leave behind. No one at Hillcrest High knows that Pony is transgender, and he intends to keep it that way. Georgia’s last boyfriend shook her trust in boys, and now she’s determined to forget him. As mutual attraction draws them together, Pony and Georgia must decide what they are willing to risk for a relationship. Pony’s best friend, Max, who is also transgender, disapproves of Pony’s choice to live stealth; this disagreement leads to serious conflict in their relationship. Meanwhile, Georgia and Pony behave as if Pony’s trans identity was a secret he was lying to her about rather than private information for him to share of his own volition. The characters only arrive at a hopeful resolution after Pony pays high physical and emotional prices. McSmith places repeated emphasis on the born-in-the-wrong-body narrative when the characters discuss trans identities. Whiteness is situated as the norm, and all main characters are white.
Several yards short of a touchdown. (Fiction. 14-17)Pub Date: May 26, 2020
ISBN: 978-0-06-294317-0
Page Count: 368
Publisher: HarperTeen
Review Posted Online: Feb. 8, 2020
Kirkus Reviews Issue: March 15, 2020
BOOK REVIEW
An emotionally engaging closer that fumbles in its final moments.
Lara Jean prepares for college and a wedding.
Korean-American Lara Jean is finally settled into a nice, complication-free relationship with her white boyfriend, Peter. But things don’t stay simple for long. When college acceptance letters roll in, Peter and Lara Jean discover they’re heading in different directions. As the two discuss the long-distance thing, Lara Jean’s widower father is making a major commitment: marrying the neighbor lady he’s been dating. The whirlwind of a wedding, college visits, prom, and the last few months of senior year provides an excellent backdrop for this final book about Lara Jean. The characters ping from event to event with emotions always at the forefront. Han further develops her cast, pushing them to new maturity and leaving few stones unturned. There’s only one problem here, and it’s what’s always held this series back from true greatness: Peter. Despite Han’s best efforts to flesh out Peter with abandonment issues and a crummy dad, he remains little more than a handsome jock. Frankly, Lara Jean and Peter may have cute teen chemistry, but Han's nuanced characterizations have often helped to subvert typical teen love-story tropes. This knowing subversion is frustratingly absent from the novel's denouement.
An emotionally engaging closer that fumbles in its final moments. (Romance. 14-17)Pub Date: May 2, 2017
ISBN: 978-1-4814-3048-7
Page Count: 336
Publisher: Simon & Schuster
Review Posted Online: March 28, 2017
Kirkus Reviews Issue: April 15, 2017
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