reviews 14+Secondary/Adult continued


have sold this debut novel before her 18th birthday is some achievement. Garrett’s language is alive with


honesty and energy, reflecting the viewpoint and empathy of someone writing from within the age group of her major characters and her readership. Her narrator, Simone Garcia-Hampton, is in her Junior (penultimate) year of High School. The quickfire, witty conversations between Simone and her friends, Claudia and Lydia, range easily from masturbation and vibrators to the relative merits of


differently


flavoured condoms; in fact, Claudia knows how to make your own dental dam out of a condom, should you happen to need one. They are equally at ease chatting about being bi, being gay or being straight. Some areas are more difficult for Simone, however. She is HIV Positive from birth and at her last school, she shared this with her closest friend who betrayed her trust, setting irrational fear and hatred blazing among students and parents. In the end, she quit. She’s been settling in since September at a local school, not far from San Francisco. She longs to spread the Science – about viral loads, about the U=U rule (Undetectable = Untransmittable) and the efficacy of current medication; but understandably, she remains silent, keeping her diagnosis to herself. The only place she can talk, with increasing freedom, is in a therapy group at the hospital with peers who also have HIV. Recently, she’s found Miles, a black guy on the stage crew of the school musical which she is student- directing. He’s disconcertingly nice to be around. He’s also a prominent athlete


- an outstandingly good


Lacrosse player. That’s unusual – Men’s Lacrosse, even at High School, is largely a white sport. Here, I should abandon the reviewer’s conventional pretence of self-effacement; I may well be the only British reviewer of Young Adult fiction who played Men’s Lacrosse for over 20 years, including touring the USA and later coached the game in a US High School as an exchange teacher. An opportunity to mention this is unlikely to recur. The musical is Rent, which began a


12 year run on Broadway in 1996. It’s loosely based on La Boheme, but now most of the characters are affected by AIDS, in the fatal


era


effective meds. Simone dreams of a career directing musicals.


before The


teacher in charge here is interested chiefly in enhancing her own professional reputation; her direction is mechanistic, focussing on outward appearances (‘Remember people are looking at you’). The whole thing lacks passion. Simone’s earnest detailed ‘notes’ are resisted by actors used to starring in previous productions. But then, on an impulse, Simone enables a couple of singers to draw on their own feelings and experience in a key song – and the show takes fire. The novel is crowded with animated


conversations in the hallways, school clubs or on the way home; it’s one of those school stories where classes and actual work don’t significantly interrupt Relationships. Boys are not much explored in the story, except for the engaging Miles – they are inevitably seen from the outside by Simone and her friends. Adults, even Simone’s two caring, listening Dads (one a black teacher, one a Latino medical


doctor), sometimes don’t


tune in to her wavelength. Eventually, someone discovers Simone’s secret and terrifies her through notes threatening to go public, left in her locker and on her phone. Finally, she is exposed as being HIV Positive on social media, releasing a powerful and moving denouement. Garrett’s control of a complex plot of almost 300 pages is remarkable. GF


The Places I’ve Cried in Public HHHH


Holly Bourne, Usborne, 368pp, 978-1474949521, £7.99 pbk


Amelie is aged sixteen and a talented singer song-writer. Her father has found a new job in the south of England so Amelie is forced to leave her home in Sheffield, a move she finds distressing. To make matters worse Amelie has been forced to leave her boyfriend Alfie. She and Alfie have promised each other that they will wait two years: at the end of that separation they plan aged eighteen to be reunited at Manchester University. Of course matters turn out to be


more complicated. Down south Amelie meets the charming and charismatic Reese Davies. Initially Amelie is swept off her feet by Reese’s charm as well as his musical talent. He also knows how to flatter Amelie at a time when she lacks self-confidence. But as time goes by their relationship moves into something more dangerous and depressing. Bourne’s book traces the impact that change has on Reese, Amelie and the absent Alfie. As a frontispiece to her novel Bourne


has inserted a warning note. The book deals with controlling behaviour and sexual assault. This is appropriate, since


these episodes could prove


upsetting to young readers. That such oppressive behaviour does happen is incontestable. It is imperative that young people should be equipped to recognise such behaviour when confronted with it. For this reason Bourne’s endeavour deserves strong support. This reviewer however has two minor criticisms. First, the emergence of the exploitative relationship needs to be gradual – and it is. It may be however


that or the development of


this part of the narrative is actually too slow. In real life an outsider (a friend the


development


a counsellor) may spot of


an abusive


relationship before the victim. Bourne casts the reader in the role of the knowledgeable outsider who spots what’s going on before Amelie. This


tactic however runs a risk: it makes the reader both a witness to the process and an arms-length observer, an ambivalence which confuses the reader’s status. Second, in the light of Bourne’s warning, the reader is prepared for sexual assault to be quite explicitly described. Instead at the moment of truth the reader is left in some doubt whether an assault has actually taken place. It is implied rather than stated, though later made clear. Is this a failure of courage on the part of the author? RB


The Boy In The Black Suit HHH


Jason Reynolds, Faber and Faber, 255pp, 978-0-571-35612-6, £7.99 pbk


Matt’s mother has just died and his father is seeking solace in the drinking habit he abandoned 20 years ago. He knows he must supplement his studies with a job and when he is offered work at Mr Ray’s funeral parlour he realises that this may be a way both to make money and to try to come to terms with the grief which threatens to overwhelm him. If he can attend funerals and watch families grieving he might be able to understand that others suffer as he does and so he is not alone. This is a story rich in characters


and their secrets. Mr Ray has his ‘pain vault’, a cellar devoted to his dead wife and to his career as an athlete cut short by a serious injury. Lovey-who Matt begins a relationship with- works at a fast-food restaurant, runs a shelter for the homeless but her mother was murdered when she was very young. Matt’s best friend Chris is, by contrast, uncomplicated and supportive, relishing food and friendship in equal measure. The novel is set in Brooklyn and


some readers might find difficulty with the vernacular which the younger characters use – though it lends an extra layer of authenticity to the story. The ending of the book is tied up a little too neatly: Matt realises that he and Chris heard Lovey’s mother being murdered by her abusive partner when, as children, they both slept at Chris’s apartment; at the Christmas dinner for the homeless he meets the man who inflicted the injury which ended Mr. Ray’s career. However, this novel is an unflinching


portrayal of guilt on several levels and Reynolds has tackled a difficult subject with energy and conviction. VR


India Smythe Stands Up HHHH


Sarah Govett, Marotte, 237pp, 978- 1-9161-5260-1, £7.99 pbk


Matt’s mother has just died and his father is seeking solace in the This is a laugh-out-loud story with a thoughtful subtext. India is very used to being at the bottom of the social league at school and no-one could ever accuse her loyal friends Anna and Meena of being well-informed fashion


icons.


That was left to Lisa and April, the It girls of Year 11-brittle, image-obsessed


shallow, and unremittingly Books for Keeps No.239 November 2019 33


cruel to those they considered to be their inferiors. Their boyfriends were cast in the same mould – so it came as a huge shock to India when she was asked out by Ennis, one of these minor gods. Eager to be a part of the highest social echelon, she accepts. Govett has a real talent


for creating excruciatingly funny set-


pieces - in school, at home, at parties - and peopling them with instantly


recognisable


She peppers this with the sort of preoccupations


with which most


teenage girls are all too familiar and weaves in a slapstick humour. What is most impressive is her ear for dialogue: there is an unerring realism about everything from her grasp of surreally funny family conversations to the awkwardnesses of first date verbal stumblings. I raised a cheer when India finally rejected the social lure of


Ennis’


revered but tedious company and opted for the boy she’d liked all along - unaffected and endearing Rich, with the too-high forehead and a passion for the highly unfashionable school orchestra. VR


Because of You HHHH


Eve Ainsworth, Barrington Stoke, 112pp, 978-1781128671, £7.99 pbk


This is a story in part at least about how young people respond to today’s flexible partnership arrangements. Poppy is aged fourteen, in year nine at school. Her mother has a new partner, Richie. He is moving in together with his own daughter Kayla, aged sixteen. Poppy detests her mother’s new man. She adores her father and resent her mother for kicking him out. At


school another Poppy witnesses girl, Emily, being bullied.


Poppy supports Emily in her hour of need and then becomes a target for the same mean girls. They pour a milkshake over Poppy’s head, film it and post the video on a school chat room for everyone to see and comment on. In her hour of need Poppy turns


to her absent father. She is not sure how far she can rely on his support, or indeed what secrets might be unveiled as a result of her seeking help.


Despite the brevity of a book under a hundred pages, Ainsworth


pulls


off a considerable authorial feat. In this short span she presents three complete and separate strands of narrative development – namely the reaction to flexible partnership arrangements, cyber bullying and the secret flaw of Poppy’s father, which underlay his expulsion from the family home. Inevitably the


reader feels


that each of these three narrative themes could have been developed at greater length. The important point however is to appreciate the skill with which the author has addressed this particular target. RB


stereotypes.


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