Unclaimed Baggage
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- $11.99
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- $11.99
Publisher Description
*A New York Times Staff Pick*
*An NPR Best Book of 2018*
*A Buzzfeed Best YA Book of 2018*
In Jen Doll's young adult debut novel, Unclaimed Baggage, Doris—a lone liberal in a conservative small town—has mostly kept to herself since the terrible waterslide incident a few years ago. Nell had to leave behind her best friends, perfect life, and too-good-to-be-true boyfriend in Chicago to move to Alabama. Grant was the star quarterback and epitome of "Mr. Popular" whose drinking problem has all but destroyed his life. What do these three have in common? A summer job working in a store called Unclaimed Baggage cataloging and selling other people's lost luggage. Together they find that through friendship, they can unpack some of their own emotional baggage and move on into the future.
PUBLISHERS WEEKLY
What happens to the suitcases left unclaimed at airports? They go to stores that sort through, and sell, their contents. Sixteen-year-old Doris works at just such a store in a small Alabama town, as do Nell and fellow high schooler Grant, and the three teens become unlikely friends. Doris is an anomaly in their conservative town because she doesn't believe in God and doesn't mind saying so; Nell's family has just moved from Chicago; and Grant was a local football hero, until his drinking cost him his position on the team, his girlfriend, and his self-respect. In her YA debut, Doll skillfully integrates three alternating voices especially Doris, with her gift for finding things in a story threaded through with relationships and identities lost and found. Over the course of the summer, junk and treasures, both sentimental and real, pass through the shop; family history is reclaimed; and things, stories, and people find new places to belong. Ages 12 up.)
