Promise Me Something
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- $9.99
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- $9.99
Publisher Description
As if starting high school weren't bad enough, Reyna Fey has to do so at a new school without her best friends. Reyna's plan is to keep her head down, help her father recover from the car accident that almost took his life, and maybe even make some friends. And then Olive Barton notices her. Olive is not exactly the kind of new friend Reyna has in mind. The boys make fun of her, the girls want to fight her, and Olive seems to welcome the challenge. There's something about Olive that Reyna can't help but like. But when Reyna learns Olive's secret, she must decide whether it's better to be good friends with an outcast or fake friends with the popular kids. . . .before she loses Olive forever.
PUBLISHERS WEEKLY
When Reyna Fey's house is redistricted, it means she'll be starting high school at Belltown High, while all her friends will attend nearby Ridgeway. Seven years earlier, Reyna's mother was killed by a drunk driver, and a recent car accident nearly did the same to her father, so Reyna is angry and scared when blunt, bossy, and painfully unpopular Olive Barton bounds into her life. "You're the only person in this school who needs a friend as much as me," Olive tells Reina, who can't exactly disagree. They begin a tentative friendship, but Olive doesn't fit in with Reyna's increasingly distant friends from middle school, and when Olive shares a deeply held secret about herself, Reyna's reaction, born in part out of her own conservative upbringing, has potentially devastating consequences. Kocek's hard-hitting first novel offers smart dialogue, sharp descriptions, and a plot that unfolds in unexpected ways, as she explores the destructive power of casual, everyday homophobia, especially in a claustrophobic high school environment where adults and students are content to look the other way. Ages 13 up.
