The Accident Season

May 11, 2015
It’s the last week of the “accident season”—the superstitious way Cara’s family marks October—and the 17-year-old is trying to avoid disaster. That’s difficult when she is simultaneously unraveling a strange discovery that involves her family’s photos and trying to be a regular teenager, including grappling with confusing romantic feelings for Sam, her ex-stepbrother. Debut author Fowley-Doyle weaves an enchanting ghost story set in a small Irish river town, where magical elements collide with brutal realities. Elsie, the classmate who can be seen in Cara’s family pictures, is the harbinger of the unveiling of secrets, putting a commonsensical twist on what Cara’s mother has chalked up to the family’s terrible luck. Like a phantom guide, Elsie shows up in shop windows and old newspaper clippings, leaving a trail of clues that sends Cara and her siblings to a decrepit haunted house on the edge of town. The answers lead to a fairly predictable plot twist, but the endearing coming-of-age narrative about emotionally scarred young adults trying to find their tribe more than compensates. Ages 14–up.

Starred review from May 1, 2015
Ghosts, secrets, and magic collide in this Irish author's astonishing debut. For as long as she can remember, 17-year-old Cara, her mother, and her 18-year-old sister, Alice, have dreaded the accident season. For a few weeks every autumn, horrible things happen in their family. "Bones break, skin tears, bruises bloom." And sometimes people die, including Cara's father nine years ago. Since then she's gained a new ex-stepbrother, Sam (he stayed with them when his own father disappeared), and a new best friend, mystical Bea, somewhat callously, or so she thinks, abandoning Elsie, the friend who supported her during her childhood grief. Elsie still attends their school but has mysteriously gone missing. Only when they throw a Halloween party in a haunted house, inviting everyone they know to come as the people they are behind their everyday masks, do the secrets start to ignite. Elsie is worn out from trying to protect them all-and some of the accidents weren't accidental. Written in Cara's voice, Fowley-Doyle's unflinching first-person narration conveys the impossible in prosaic, ordinary language that nonetheless sings: "I think of all the things our brains deny, all the memories they hide from us, all the secrets they keep." What emerges from the smokescreen is a moving portrait of a fractured family, knitting itself back together with courage and love. A powerful novel from an exciting new talent. (Fiction. 14 & up)

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Starred review from August 1, 2015

Gr 10 Up-Triple layers of protective clothing, padded furniture, knives locked away, and the gas turned off. It's October, the accident season for Cara's family, but all her mother's precautions will not be enough to protect them from the cuts, bruises, broken bones, or worse. Cara's sprained wrist and her sister Alice's concussion are minor compared to previous years, though Bea's tarot cards indicate that this will be one of the worst accident seasons yet. Cara has just discovered that her elusive former friend, Elsie, mysteriously appears in every photo in her scrapbook, past and present. Unfortunately, Elsie has disappeared from her usual spot in the school library and, other than Cara's best friend Bea and her ex-stepbrother Sam, no one seems to know who she is. As the last week of October commences, finding Elsie takes on a sense of urgency for Cara, who senses she may somehow be connected to the yearly turmoil in her family's lives. With Halloween fast approaching, all the horror of accident seasons past begins coming back to haunt them, and the lies and secrets that each family member has locked away gradually come to light. Similar in style to Alice Hoffman's Practical Magic (Putnam, 1995), Fowley-Doyle's stunning debut novel weaves the temporal and the spiritual into a seamless reality, rich in emotional impact. Devastating loss and abuse are balanced by romance, teen hijinks, and spine-tingling discoveries. Provocative content adds to the intensity and will keep readers riveted. VERDICT This thought-provoking narrative will cast its spell over older teens and adults alike.-Cary Frostick, formerly at Mary Riley Styles Public Library, Falls Church, VA

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