Jaded teens, tabloid travails, and murder, oh my!
Early in Lisbon’s novel it’s clear that 17-year-old former child star Eva-Kate Kelly is dead, and 16-year-old Justine Childs, obsessive Taylor Swift fan and daughter of a celebrity therapist, wants readers to know that she didn’t do it. Justine has lightly rubbed elbows with celebrities all her life, but to her enduring agony, she’s never truly been a part of that world. When emancipated Eva-Kate becomes her new Venice Beach neighbor, star-struck Justine, whose mom is on vacation, is free to enter Eva-Kate’s world—and it’s a strange one. Eva-Kate makes Justine her new bestie, introduces her to oodles of drugs and alcohol, and plays plenty of mind games. The alternately naïve and world-weary Justine is enthralled with the dynamic Eva-Kate and may not be a trustworthy narrator. After all, Justine mentions that she’s on medication and has spent time in a psychiatric ward, although she elaborates little. Of course, Justine discovers that Eva-Kate has been keeping an explosive secret. Soon after, Eva-Kate is dead, and Justine is the main suspect. Frustratingly, readers hoping to delve into Eva-Kate’s murder and the aftermath will have to wait until the next book. All main characters assume a white default.
A salaciously entertaining debut that is also a disturbing and often depressing look at celebrity obsession, scandal, and teen angst, lit with a lurid sheen of Hollywood noir. (Fiction. 14-18)Pub Date: March 26, 2019
ISBN: 978-1-250-15629-7
Page Count: 288
Publisher: Henry Holt
Review Posted Online: Dec. 18, 2018
Kirkus Reviews Issue: Jan. 15, 2019
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BOOK REVIEW
Riveting, brutal and beautifully told.
26
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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: TEENS & YOUNG ADULT FAMILY | TEENS & YOUNG ADULT SOCIAL THEMES
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PROFILES
This grittily provocative debut explores the horrors of self-harm and the healing power of artistic expression.
20
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After surviving a suicide attempt, a fragile teen isn't sure she can endure without cutting herself.
Seventeen-year-old Charlie Davis, a white girl living on the margins, thinks she has little reason to live: her father drowned himself; her bereft and abusive mother kicked her out; her best friend, Ellis, is nearly brain dead after cutting too deeply; and she's gone through unspeakable experiences living on the street. After spending time in treatment with other young women like her—who cut, burn, poke, and otherwise hurt themselves—Charlie is released and takes a bus from the Twin Cities to Tucson to be closer to Mikey, a boy she "like-likes" but who had pined for Ellis instead. But things don't go as planned in the Arizona desert, because sweet Mikey just wants to be friends. Feeling rejected, Charlie, an artist, is drawn into a destructive new relationship with her sexy older co-worker, a "semifamous" local musician who's obviously a junkie alcoholic. Through intense, diarylike chapters chronicling Charlie's journey, the author captures the brutal and heartbreaking way "girls who write their pain on their bodies" scar and mar themselves, either succumbing or surviving. Like most issue books, this is not an easy read, but it's poignant and transcendent as Charlie breaks more and more before piecing herself back together.
This grittily provocative debut explores the horrors of self-harm and the healing power of artistic expression. (author’s note) (Fiction. 14 & up)Pub Date: Aug. 30, 2016
ISBN: 978-1-101-93471-5
Page Count: 416
Publisher: Delacorte
Review Posted Online: May 4, 2016
Kirkus Reviews Issue: May 15, 2016
Categories: TEENS & YOUNG ADULT FICTION | TEENS & YOUNG ADULT SOCIAL THEMES
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