True Blue

February 1, 2012
Known for powerful tales of social injustice in the developing world, Ellis here offers readers a flawed but gripping character study of teens in small-town Canada. Recognized as the best friend of Casey White, a girl who was tried for murder in a sensational case, waitress and narrator Jess decides to tell her story. As counselors at a summer camp, Jess and Casey supervised young campers, including troubled and troublesome Stephanie Glass. Casey was arrested after Stephanie was murdered and her favorite T-shirt turned up, bloodstained, in Casey's duffle. Interwoven with Jess's account are flashbacks to their long friendship. These recollections work against the framing narrative device, in which Jess addresses a putative customer. Jess, an outcast, longs to be someone's best friend; her attraction to Casey makes sense. But what does Casey see in Jess? Casey has no interest in peer acceptance. With a lifelong passion for insects, she plans to become an entomologist. Aimless, lazy Jess has no ambition beyond securing Casey's undivided attention and loyalty--that is, until Casey's arrest gives her entree to the popular crowd. Casey, whose misplaced loyalty indicates startling ignorance of her friend's character, is a bore. Jess--sharply insightful, but selfish and entirely lacking in empathy--may be a piece of work, but she grabs readers' attention and never lets it go. (Fiction. 12 & up)

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May 1, 2012

Gr 8-11-Ellis explores the courage it takes to stand up for a friend in a town shattered by a murder. Jess's best friend, Casey White, has ambition and passion. A budding entomologist, she seeks an adventurous life outside their small town. So when Casey is inexplicably arrested for the murder of a girl at a camp where the teens are counselors, Jess feels incredibly alone. The townspeople are quick to assume Casey's guilt. While Jess's mother (a woman with a mental illness) demands a call to action to release Casey from jail, Jess says nothing to defend her best friend to her cruel and small-minded classmates. Jess wants Casey to be exonerated and goes so far as to dream up an escape plan but, in the end, she fails to come to Casey's aid and actually helps the prosecution build the against her. Ellis's masterful novel makes every word count, thus highlighting Jess as a deeply conflicted, not totally reliable, narrator who is so afraid of losing the only part of her life that she values-Casey-that she doesn't realize how much her actions have cost her. A compelling and moving read, True Blue is about the courage to believe in oneself and fight for what's right, even when it is the hardest thing to do. A book worthy of any school curriculum.-Kimberly Garnick Giarratano, Northampton Community College, Hawley, PA

Copyright 2012 School Library Journal, LLC Used with permission.

May 1, 2012
Grades 5-8 Don't let the generic title fool you. This intelligent mystery is a complete 180 from the author's leprosy-in-India tale, No Ordinary Day (2011), but is similar in how its impact sneaks up on you. Seventeen-year-old Jess should be devastated that her best and only friend, Casey, has been arrested for the murder of Stephanie, an eight-year-old kid the two teens struggled to control a few weeks ago as camp counselors. And yet Jess is oddly ambivalent about the whole thing. Flashbacks delivered in the style of a journal (written in present tense, an unfitting, awkward choice) fill in the blanks of the day-to-day camp goings-on, revealing that horrid little Stephanie was a remorseless thief and vandal. Is it any surprise that someone finally went crazy? The unreliability of Jess' first-person account becomes increasingly obvious as we learn the depths of Jess' jealousy and the dubiousness of her morals. The mystery here is not just a whodunit but how loyalty and betrayal can rest along such a razor's edge.(Reprinted with permission of Booklist, copyright 2012, American Library Association.)