Stranded

August 1, 2010

Gr 9 Up-Narrated in Kelly Louise's often-breezy, 15-year-old voice, this story is set into motion when a newborn is found dead in a cornfield. Kelly Louise and her mother move to rural Heaven, IA, to support the teen's grandmother and her deeply religious, uncommonly beautiful cousin. Natalie, it turns out, is the mother of Baby Grace, though it is never clear why she chooses to confide in her aunt. The girls have little in common: as Kelly Louise texts her hip friend back in Des Moines, Natalie makes signs for her youth group vigil in memory of the infant. The tone of the story varies from funny (rule-bound Nana is described as "the old S.S. Unpack This Second") to serious (a baby has died, after all) to descriptions of school events and musings on conservation and ecology. At times the story seems to absolve Natalie because someone took advantage of her and she blocked out the fact that she was pregnant, while at others she seems to be nursing a guilty conscience for breaking her virginity pledge. Equal in focus to the abandoned-baby story line is Kelly Louise's realistically portrayed relationship with a rock-band-wannabe neighbor and her loss of virginity while under the influence of pot. At the end of the novel, she sets into play events that lead to Natalie's arrest, although details are few as to how this affects Natalie or her family. Stranded might have readers where books such as Amy Efaw's After (Viking, 2009) have an audience.-Maggie Knapp, Trinity Valley School, Fort Worth, TX

Copyright 2010 School Library Journal, LLC Used with permission.

September 27, 2010
Kelly Louise Sorenson is dragged out of Des Moines by her mother to live with her grandmother and cousin Natalie in the nearby small town of Heaven, where a baby was recently found abandoned and dead in a cornfield; this mystery propels the narrative, leading toward an unsettling disclosure. Kelly Louise (an only child raised by a single mother) is used to uninterrupted attention, and when she arrives in her new home, she has to adjust to her grandmother's overbearing rules and her cousin's narrow-minded views. But while Kelly Louise craves "wickedness, adventure, sex, not to be alone, not to be trapped in some distant town away from a place where you could buy coffee," she also marvels at the "sexual traffic" among her peers who've taken abstinence vows. Dutton's (Freaked) complex second novel points to the difficulties of expressing individuality, while also developing compassion for others. Her narrator's voice is sympathetic and consistently punchy ("Sorensons are very emotional—possibly the reason we have a history of farm foreclosure and alcoholism"), but it's through her unexpected connection to "Baby Grace" that Kelly Louise reveals her true depth of character. Ages 14–up.