All That Shines
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- ¥2,200
発行者による作品情報
A contemplative novel in verse that questions what it means to lose everything you once treasured and rediscover yourself, falling in love along the way.
Chloe Brooks has only ever known what it's like to have everything. Her parents' wealth and place in society meant she had all she wanted, and friends everywhere she turned. Until it all crashes down: Her father is arrested in the middle of the night, under investigation for fraud.
Bankrupt and facing foreclosure, Chloe must forgo her lavish summer plans as she and her mom are forced to move into one of the rundown apartments they still own, just outside Lexington, Kentucky. Without her riches, Chloe loses her friends, her comfort, her confidence, and her sense of self, unsure of who she is and if she has anything to offer.
Then Chloe's new neighbors, Clint, Skye, James, and Natalia, introduce her to the side of Kentucky she's long ignored. These new friends are the only ones who see her for who she truly is, but will they stay by her side once they discover her family's true identity, or will Chloe lose them, too?
In her signature captivating verse, Ellen Hagan encapsulates the hesitant joy of reshaping your identity and rediscovering yourself.
PUBLISHERS WEEKLY
When 17-year-old Chloe Brooks's father is arrested on fraud charges, she and her mother move from their elegant Lexington, Ky., mansion to Limestone Apartments, owned by Chloe's mother. Chloe has never seen the complex, and her mother hasn't been back in a long time ("This place.../ has been abandoned./ Let go of./ Shutters loose on windows,/ the grass left unmowed,/ nothing blooming or/ growing"). Upon arrival, she meets cheerful Clint, a teenage resident who immediately offers to help the mother-daughter duo settle in. But Clint's friends are wary ("they should know/ that we are not their staff/ or their servers"), and Chloe's occasional missteps and classist behavior prompt feelings of shame within her and animosity among the other teens. When the group finds out that Chloe sings and writes music, however, they invite her to participate in their jam sessions, growing closer as a result. While characters often feel stereotypical and some poems are repetitive, Hagan (Don't Call Me a Hurricane) utilizes sensate verse to summarily cover hefty topics including financial precarity and privilege, as well as adeptly cultivate a sense of place that proves lively and immersive. Protagonists read as white; supporting characters are intersectionally diverse. Ages 13–up.
