A solid, suspenseful follow-up to the mesmerizing debut.
The saga of young Chris Buckley continues in the second volume of the Solitary Tales series.
Once fearful, 16-year-old Chris is now filled with rage at friend Jocelyn’s death. The spooky state of affairs in his adopted hometown of Solitary, N.C., hasn’t gotten any better. Both Chris and his alcoholic mother, Tara, are attacked by unidentified assailants, and though he’s been warned time and again, Chris is determined to ditch complacency and take action. A young man named Jared, claiming to be a cousin, takes Chris under his wing, advising him to “lie low” and confide in him. At Harrington High, Chris joins the track team and takes an art class, where he grows closer to fellow junior Kelsey Page. Yet Chris feels it’s a mistake for anyone to be involved with him: They’ll only get hurt. Incidents with bully Gus Staunch escalate, along with threats from Gus’ father, Ichor. Former friend Rachel is gone—supposedly she moved, like a lot of other residents who’ve been threatened and sabotaged until leaving town becomes the best option. Chris longs for the normalcy of his pre-Solitary life in Chicago, and when he gets a job at the isolated Crag’s Inn, his finances greatly improve and things might be turning around. In addition to his slow-boiling anger at Tara’s psychological meltdown, Chris encounters malevolence at nearly every turn; even the town church has a coffin that may contain the undead. He again feels the stirrings of young love, grapples with betrayal, questions his disbelief in God and considers violent action that would have been unthinkable in his former life. Gradually, it dawns upon Chris that he may have a date with destiny and perhaps a spiritual purpose amid the mayhem. As in the first book, Thrasher adroitly mixes elements of horror and high school in equally terrifying measures. And thanks to Internet access, Chris can now receive super creepy emails.
A solid, suspenseful follow-up to the mesmerizing debut.Pub Date: June 1, 2011
ISBN: 1434764192
Page Count: 432
Publisher: David C. Cook
Review Posted Online: Sept. 24, 2012
Review Program: Kirkus Indie
A dizzying, intimate romance.
Rowan teams up with her academic nemesis to win a citywide scavenger hunt.
Rowan Roth and Neil McNair have been rivals in a never-ending game of one-upmanship since freshman year. Now, on the last day of senior year, Rowan hopes to best Neil once and for all as valedictorian, then win Howl, a scavenger hunt with a $5,000 cash prize. She also hopes to sneak away to her favorite romance author’s book signing; no one’s ever respected her passion for the genre, not even her children’s book author/illustrator parents. But Rowan’s named salutatorian, and vengeful classmates plot to end her and Neil’s reign. At first their partnership is purely strategic, but as the pair traverse the city, they begin to open up. Rowan learns that Neil is Jewish too and can relate to both significant cultural touchstones and experiences of casual anti-Semitism. As much as Rowan tries to deny it, real feelings begin to bloom. Set against a lovingly evoked Seattle backdrop, Rowan and Neil’s relationship develops in an absorbing slow burn, with clever banter and the delicious tension of first love. Issues of class, anti-Semitism, and sex are discussed frankly. Readers will emerge just as obsessed with this love story as Rowan is with her beloved romance novels. Rowan’s mother is Russian Jewish and Mexican, and her father is American Jewish and presumably White; most other characters are White.
A dizzying, intimate romance. (author’s note) (Romance. 13-18)Pub Date: July 28, 2020
ISBN: 978-1-5344-4024-1
Page Count: 384
Publisher: Simon Pulse/Simon & Schuster
Review Posted Online: April 7, 2020
Kirkus Reviews Issue: May 1, 2020
Evocations of Narnia are not enough to salvage this fantasy, which struggles with thin character development.
A portal fantasy survivor story from an established devotional writer.
Fourteen-year-old Eva’s maternal grandmother lives on a grand estate in England; Eva and her academic parents live in New Haven, Connecticut. When she and Mum finally visit Carrick Hall, Eva is alternately resentful at what she’s missed and overjoyed to connect with sometimes aloof Grandmother. Alongside questions of Eva’s family history, the summer is permeated by a greater mystery surrounding the work of fictional children’s fantasy writer A.H.W. Clifton, who wrote a Narnialike series that Eva adores. As it happens, Grandmother was one of several children who entered and ruled Ternival, the world of Clifton’s books; the others perished in 1952, and Grandmother hasn’t recovered. The Narnia influences are strong—Eva’s grandmother is the Susan figure who’s repudiated both magic and God—and the ensuing trauma has created rifts that echo through her relationships with her daughter and granddaughter. An early narrative implication that Eva will visit Ternival to set things right barely materializes in this series opener; meanwhile, the religious parable overwhelms the magic elements as the story winds on. The serviceable plot is weakened by shallow characterization. Little backstory appears other than that which immediately concerns the plot, and Eva tends to respond emotionally as the story requires—resentful when her seething silence is required, immediately trusting toward characters readers need to trust. Major characters are cued white.
Evocations of Narnia are not enough to salvage this fantasy, which struggles with thin character development. (author’s note, map, author Q&A) (Religious fantasy. 12-14)Pub Date: Jan. 30, 2024
ISBN: 9780593194454
Page Count: 384
Publisher: WaterBrook
Review Posted Online: Oct. 21, 2023
Kirkus Reviews Issue: Nov. 15, 2023
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