15+ | Through a Seattle Looking Glass

Valerie was just being a normal sixteen-year-old, like all the other kids at her school. One weekend her mom went out of town. Naturally Valerie and best friend Mimi throw a party for their Mormon and non-practising Mormon friends (though neither girl believes in the faith themselves). It’s wild, loud and everyone is having fun. Val starts drinking due to her disappointment of her crush Adam not showing up, everyone’s having a great time why can’t she?

When Adam shows up, Val is ecstatic, and drunk. They excuse themselves in front of everyone and sneak off to the living room where she proceeds to throw up all over his shoes. Hung over and miserable the next morning, Val struggles to make breakfast for her six-year-old sister Ainsley. She just wants to lie on the couch and sleep off her headache. As she drifts off she realises she isn’t alone. Adam is suddenly there, everywhere. Confused over her feelings for Adam and what he has done, Val finds strength to report what’s happened. It’s only the beginning of her lifelong journey to be more than just the ‘rape girl’.

I requested this book because I wanted a different kind of YA to read. However, I was sorely disappointed but I am also conflicted with this novella. I think the premise of the book had a lot of potential, but the execution was poor. The story was rushed and there was no time to get to know Valerie, her likes, dislikes, or any kind of personality. Also, every male character except for the brother who’s away at college is written as a ‘villain’.

I understand that this is an important story to tell and that it’s also a very personal one for the author. For that Klein has done a stand out job for describing the process of standing up as a rape victim. Even as Valerie fights with her own demons she never steps down for doing the right thing. The few parts that are well written, you can tell that the author knows what she wants for her characters and what she wants to reflect to the reader. When writing about a tender subject, it can be a challenge to follow the delicate line. I praise Klein for tackling such a personal battle, but I wish that more time were spent on the narrative. Make it 300 pages and give us more in depth characters. I was always on Valerie’s side, but I knew there was more to her and I was sad to see that.

Many thanks to the publisher Namelos for providing this ARC on Net Galley!

Saba lives with her twin brother Lugh, little sister Emmie and her Pa. They live a quiet life with only one neighbour across the vast but dried up Silverlake. That is, until the men came and took Lugh away, killing Pa in the process.

Saba will never stop looking for Lugh. Leaving Silverlake she travels across the death trap Sandsea hoping to find the men that have taken him. But trouble is at every turn when one-steps away from their safe haven. The rest of the world is a scary place and Saba will have to decide who to trust and where to go, because time is running out for Lugh.

Please note that one of the genres I have added, I have created myself. I’m finding that a lot of the YA I’m reading are starting to fall into the same genres. I chose ‘Endless’ because what Young has mastered is a world in a post-apocalyptic environment that hasn’t been done before: Endless areas of sand and danger at every turn. It’s our Earth after we have destroyed it. It’s written in a phonetic type style, but as our heroine Saba has never been educated to our standards, she makes up words for things that haven’t been assigned a name in her lifetime.

If you’re able to get over the writing style (it’s slightly difficult to push through but the more you read the easier it gets), you are going to be blown away like I was. Finally, Saba, a take-charge girl who will do WHATEVER it takes to get her family back together! She’s strong, resourceful and flawed at the same time. I couldn’t guess what was going to happen next but trusted Young to keep me reading. Blood Red Road really is a fantastic read (hello – there’s a girls only Amazon type power group – seriously cool). There is some romance, which brings it back to typical YA. I don’t know how the second book is going to go. There is so much in this debut novel. For an escape of the daily commute or for an engaging Sunday morning, pick this up and you’ll have difficulty putting it down.

(Just read it now and tell me what you think in the comments)