Between

April 15, 2011

Drowned on her 18th birthday, a rich, popular girl struggles to discover what happened and learns some unpleasant truths.

Liz has always been a golden girl, the center of the most popular clique in her tony Connecticut suburb. Drowning is bad enough, but it's even worse that she has to share her afterlife with poor-kid Alex, killed in a hit-and-run several months ago, who takes pleasure in showing her what a bitch she is—or at least was. Warman introduces readers and her protagonist to the girl Liz was gradually and simultaneously. In her afterlife, ghosts have hazy memories, so Liz's understanding of her life is incomplete. With Alex's help (he's a pro at being dead), Liz learns that her family was not as perfect as she wants to believe and that she was mixed up in some seriously bad stuff. She also learns that she was shockingly, horrifically shallow. For much of the book the mystery surrounding Liz's death is subsumed in her growing recognition of her frankly unlikable personality. That readers will like her ghostly persona despite her unpleasant living one is testament to Warman's skill. While they will figure out the mystery before Liz does, they will appreciate her growth if not the rather tidy ending.

A rich and compelling character study wrapped around a mystery. (Mystery. 14-18)

(COPYRIGHT (2011) KIRKUS REVIEWS/NIELSEN BUSINESS MEDIA, INC. ALL RIGHTS RESERVED.)

September 1, 2011

Gr 10 Up-In this tale of two teens who meet in the afterlife, Warman cleverly intertwines Elizabeth Valchar and Alex Berg's budding friendship with flashbacks to their small hometown in suburban Connecticut. A dead mother, a workaholic father who drinks too much, and rumors that her stepsister is actually her half sister all conspired to make popular Liz one unhappy rich girl. By contrast, Alex was a nobody, shunned by her crowd. As each character seeks answers to the unsolved mysteries of their tragic deaths, a story with two ghosts as protagonists turns into a suspenseful whodunit. Readers interested in wandering souls will find these two hard to resist. Some of Alex's virtue could have built Liz more character, but Alex lacks nerve-which Liz, with her arrogance and sense of entitlement, possesses in abundance. Already dead a year, Alex has had experience as a time-traveling ghost and that makes him a reluctant guide when Liz arrives fresh from her demise after a night of drinking and doing drugs on her family's boat. Together they sample a full menu of past and present nightmares (to the loss of a parent in childhood add anorexia, robbery, hit-and-run driving, and sexual exploitation), any one of which might have explained why Elizabeth jumped-or was pushed-to her death. The answers they seek can be found in the Ten Commandments, but Between lets readers dabble in a full accounting of tragedy, perversity, and drama instead. Some plot twists strain credibility, but the novel's surprising resolution rings true.-Georgia Christgau, Middle College High School, Long Island City, NY

Copyright 2011 School Library Journal, LLC Used with permission.

Starred review from September 15, 2011
Grades 8-11 *Starred Review* At 18, Liz is popular, comfortable (let's face itshe's spoiled), in love with lifelong friend Richie, and certain of her parents' and stepsister's love and caring. And then she wakes up dead. To make matters worse, she is also stuck in the company of another dead teen: unpopular, poor, and angry Alex, who was killed in a hit-and-run a year earlier. Warman employs tropes that have become shopwornthe dead narrator, the seemingly heartless and self-centered rich girl, the criminal undercurrent within the good crowdand weaves them into a compelling tale that requires only a bit of suspension of disbelief. Liz and Alex embark on a detective effort in order to identify how Liz came to drown during her birthday party. There is a second mystery to resolve as well: what was causing her to feel increasingly troubled during her final months of life, and why did that change evoke concern from everyone around her except, possibly, her stepsister? Warman infuses what might have been a slight plot with some heady insights about the effects of parental behavior on children and about struggles with forgiveness, repentance, and religion. A perfect read for teens who like complex characterseven if they are fabulously wealthy or supernaturally disturbed.(Reprinted with permission of Booklist, copyright 2011, American Library Association.)