THE OTHER SIDE OF BLUE

Cyan travels with her artist mother to the Caribbean island of Curaçao, their yearly vacation destination and the place of her father’s accidental death the year before. The already-strained relationship between Cyan and her mother threatens to break as Cyan investigates the mysterious details surrounding the tragedy. The arrival of Kammi, Cyan’s future stepsister and rival for her mother’s attention, fuels Cyan’s anger, causing her to lash out at those around her. Artful writing and beautiful imagery combine to create a study of the various portraits of grief. Unfortunately, Cyan seems at once too old and too naïve. Readers may become impatient with the mystery that remains hidden only to the characters, and Cyan’s random anger and improbable attraction to Mayur, a local boy who is almost predatory, is unsettling. While the heart of the story is true, uneven execution and overwriting keep this tale from hitting its mark. (Fiction. 12 & up)