Release
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3.5 • 2 Ratings
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- $11.99
Publisher Description
Inspired by Judy Blume’s Forever and Virginia Woolf’s Mrs. Dalloway, this novel that Andrew Smith calls “beautiful, enchanting, [and] exquisitely written” is a new classic about teenage relationships, self-acceptance—and what happens when the walls we build start coming down. A Kirkus Best Book of 2017!
Adam Thorn doesn’t know it yet, but today will change his life.
Between his religious family, a deeply unpleasant ultimatum from his boss, and his own unrequited love for his sort-of ex, Enzo, it seems as though Adam’s life is falling apart. At least he has two people to keep him sane: his new boyfriend (he does love Linus, doesn’t he?) and his best friend, Angela.
But all day long, old memories and new heartaches come crashing together, throwing Adam’s life into chaos. The bindings of his world are coming untied one by one; yet in spite of everything he has to let go, he may also find freedom in the release.
From the New York Times bestselling author of A Monster Calls comes a raw, darkly funny, and deeply affecting story about the courage it takes to live your truth.
PUBLISHERS WEEKLY
A heartbreaking dual narrative follows Adam, a gay teenager with homophobic parents, and the ghost of a classmate murdered by her meth-addicted boyfriend, over the course of one, defining day. In the hours before a going-away party for his first love, Adam Thorn has fateful confrontations with his evangelical pastor father and with the creepy boss who has been sexually harassing him. But the real bombshell is dropped when Angela, a friend Adam relies on, announces that she's moving from Washington State to the Netherlands for senior year. Ness (The Rest of Us Just Live Here) interleaves Adam's multipronged crisis with a strand tracking the murdered girl's spirit as it seeks revenge (in the company of a seven-foot-tall faun) against her killer. Adam's story dominates the narrative and provides a frank, riveting portrayal of a gay teenager's sexual awakening (an endnote acknowledges the influence of both Woolf's Mrs. Dalloway and Blume's Forever). The paranormal storyline isn't quite as affecting as the plotline that follows Adam, but it conveys a sense of the mystery that can infuse ordinary lives. Ages 14 up.
