This clever comedy strands a starstruck girl on a deserted island with major celebrities.
Francesca, an aspiring writer who devours tabloid journalism by the ream, enters an essay contest and wins a trip to Africa to promote literacy. She quickly learns that, far from being a dream come true, her experience won’t be entirely pleasant. The party comprises two rival young actresses, both already fading from fame; the hottest, yet not-so-very-bright teen heartthrob of the day; a fatherly, also-fading actor who pilots the plane; the Christian rocker illegitimate son of the fatherly actor-pilot; a TMZ-like gay blogger; and Francesca, with her exploding red hair and freckles. The protagonist’s six egomaniacal companions prove mostly useless, starting with the fatherly actor who crashes their plane, neglects to send a distress message and lets their signal fire go out. With the only actual adult sunk in depression, the rest act out their jealousies on each other. Francesca copes by writing and stockpiling text messages to her best friend. The scenario makes for some marvelous dry humor, enhanced by Tanen’s ability to turn an original phrase: “OMG she was the size of a lima bean.” Yes, the characters learn some important and dramatic lessons and maturity happens, but the thrust of this book is comedy, and it scores.
A witty winner aimed straight at reality-TV fans. (Comedy adventure. 12 & up)Pub Date: May 1, 2011
ISBN: 978-1-4022-5461-1
Page Count: 368
Publisher: Sourcebooks Fire
Review Posted Online: April 5, 2011
Kirkus Reviews Issue: April 15, 2011
Categories: TEEN FICTION | TEEN SOCIAL THEMES
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BOOK REVIEW
BOOK REVIEW
This story is necessary. This story is important.
16
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Sixteen-year-old Starr Carter is a black girl and an expert at navigating the two worlds she exists in: one at Garden Heights, her black neighborhood, and the other at Williamson Prep, her suburban, mostly white high school.
Walking the line between the two becomes immensely harder when Starr is present at the fatal shooting of her childhood best friend, Khalil, by a white police officer. Khalil was unarmed. Khalil’s death becomes national news, where he’s called a thug and possible drug dealer and gangbanger. His death becomes justified in the eyes of many, including one of Starr’s best friends at school. The police’s lackadaisical attitude sparks anger and then protests in the community, turning it into a war zone. Questions remain about what happened in the moments leading to Khalil’s death, and the only witness is Starr, who must now decide what to say or do, if anything. Thomas cuts to the heart of the matter for Starr and for so many like her, laying bare the systemic racism that undergirds her world, and she does so honestly and inescapably, balancing heartbreak and humor. With smooth but powerful prose delivered in Starr’s natural, emphatic voice, finely nuanced characters, and intricate and realistic relationship dynamics, this novel will have readers rooting for Starr and opening their hearts to her friends and family.
This story is necessary. This story is important. (Fiction. 14-adult)Pub Date: Feb. 28, 2017
ISBN: 978-0-06-249853-3
Page Count: 464
Publisher: Balzer + Bray/HarperCollins
Review Posted Online: Dec. 6, 2016
Kirkus Reviews Issue: Dec. 15, 2016
Categories: TEEN FICTION | TEEN SOCIAL THEMES
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BOOK REVIEW
SEEN & HEARD
SEEN & HEARD
Riveting, brutal and beautifully told.
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A devastating tale of greed and secrets springs from the summer that tore Cady’s life apart.
Cady Sinclair’s family uses its inherited wealth to ensure that each successive generation is blond, beautiful and powerful. Reunited each summer by the family patriarch on his private island, his three adult daughters and various grandchildren lead charmed, fairy-tale lives (an idea reinforced by the periodic inclusions of Cady’s reworkings of fairy tales to tell the Sinclair family story). But this is no sanitized, modern Disney fairy tale; this is Cinderella with her stepsisters’ slashed heels in bloody glass slippers. Cady’s fairy-tale retellings are dark, as is the personal tragedy that has led to her examination of the skeletons in the Sinclair castle’s closets; its rent turns out to be extracted in personal sacrifices. Brilliantly, Lockhart resists simply crucifying the Sinclairs, which might make the family’s foreshadowed tragedy predictable or even satisfying. Instead, she humanizes them (and their painful contradictions) by including nostalgic images that showcase the love shared among Cady, her two cousins closest in age, and Gat, the Heathcliff-esque figure she has always loved. Though increasingly disenchanted with the Sinclair legacy of self-absorption, the four believe family redemption is possible—if they have the courage to act. Their sincere hopes and foolish naïveté make the teens’ desperate, grand gesture all that much more tragic.
Riveting, brutal and beautifully told. (Fiction. 14 & up)Pub Date: May 13, 2014
ISBN: 978-0-385-74126-2
Page Count: 240
Publisher: Delacorte
Review Posted Online: March 17, 2014
Kirkus Reviews Issue: April 1, 2014
Categories: TEEN FAMILY | TEEN SOCIAL THEMES
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