She Is Not Invisible

Starred review from February 3, 2014
Printz-winner Sedgwick (Midwinterblood) again demonstrates his remarkable versatility, trading the generations-spanning horrors of his recent books for an equally tense contemporary story about coincidence, obsession, and the ways in which we see the world. When 16-year-old Laureth Peak learns that a notebook belonging to her father, a well-known author, has surfaced in New York City, she’s sure something is wrong. Using one of her mother’s credit cards, she buys plane tickets for herself and her younger brother, Benjamin, and flies from London to J.F.K., embarking on a search that takes them across three boroughs. Why would Laureth involve seven-year-old Benjamin in such a risky, impulsive trip? Because she needs him: she’s blind. As the mystery builds, Sedgwick includes increasingly frenzied excerpts from Laureth’s father’s notebook to introduce concepts like apophenia, numinousness, and synchronicity, which are rattling around his brain. Through questions of what—if anything—coincidences mean and a careful and acute account of Laureth’s experience of the world (including the brave, hardened exterior she maintains to keep from becoming invisible in others’ eyes), Sedgwick challenges readers to rethink how they look at life itself. Ages 12–up.

Starred review from February 15, 2014
A thriller that challenges readers' understanding of the universe. Laureth's best-selling novelist father, Jack Peak, left for Switzerland to research his latest book, so why did his notebook turn up in New York City? In this departure from Sedgwick's atmospheric historical fiction and fantasy, the British 16-year-old (named for a shampoo ingredient) suspects foul play. Seizing on her parents' troubled marriage and her mother's trip to visit family, Laureth books a flight to New York. She also takes her younger brother, Benjamin, not just because she's in charge of him, but because she needs him: Laureth is blind. After recovering the notebook, she learns more about her father's latest idea-turned-obsession. Well-known for his humorous books, Jack Peak experienced a coincidence that changed his life--and writing. Since then, he's been chasing down answers to Carl Jung's theory of synchronicity, more commonly known as coincidence. Snippets of his notebook offer true, fascinating revelations about Albert Einstein, Wolfgang Pauli, Edgar Allan Poe and other scientists and authors involved in exploring coincidence. Now the determined teen uses the notebook (excerpts of which are printed in faux handwriting interspersed throughout the narrative) to search for clues about her missing father. In short, taut chapters, her first-person narration allows readers to experience the intrigue through her abilities and shows her tender relationship with Benjamin. It's no coincidence that Sedgwick has crafted yet another gripping tale of wonder. (Thriller. 13 & up)

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May 1, 2014

Gr 8 Up-Laureth Peak, 16, has just kidnapped her seven-year-old brother and negotiated her way through two major airports on both sides of the Atlantic Ocean and is on her way to meet up with someone she's only met via email. The reason for her drastic and dangerous actions? Her author father, who is supposed to be in Switzerland on a research assignment for his esoteric novel on coincidences, is not answering her phone calls and his precious notebook is currently in the possession of a stranger in Queens, NY. The teen sets out on this quest to find her missing father, with a niggling premonition that something sinister has befallen him. However, Laureth is blind, and she needs the aid of her little brother to maneuver through the streets of New York City, fancy hotels, taxis, and subways. The coincidences that pervade the suspenseful novel border on contrivances, but Sedgwick stops just shy of that in this intricately plotted tale that would be right at home as an episode of J. J. Abrams's Lost. The protagonist's first-person narration (which includes no mention of descriptions that involve sight) is interspersed with the pages from her dad's notebook that refer to secret societies, Edgar Allan Poe, philosophy, and physics. Laureth's ability to string together connections while under duress and her sibling's inability to handle devices without circuit breaking them seem quite preternatural and add an air of otherworldliness. At times heavy-handed, this novel will have readers feeling a creepy sensation on the backs of their necks long after the last page.-Shelley Diaz, School Library Journal

Copyright 2014 School Library Journal, LLC Used with permission.

Starred review from February 1, 2014
Grades 7-11 *Starred Review* Teenage Laureth didn't really abduct her precocious seven-year-old brother, Benjamin. She just needed his help to travel from their home in London to New York City to track down their missing author father. Why would she need Benjamin's help? Laureth is blind. Once Laureth and Benjamin find their father's precious notebook, they cleverly follow a trail of clues based on his lifelong obsession with coincidences. As they read his increasingly disturbing notes, they start noticing coincidences all around them, and soon a real sense of danger sets in. Has their father unlocked some forbidden truth about the universe? Or are they just finding patterns because they want to? Laureth's first-person narration (notably free of visual descriptions) is full of frustrations about how people perceive her, insecurities about her limitations, and the courageous resourcefulness born of her fundamental differences. Sedgwick (Midwinterblood, 2013) plunges us deep into Laureth's experience, detailing the actions and considerations that seem tiny to the sightedsuch as deciphering money, shaking hands, using a phone, or standing in linebut which are wholly different for the visually impaired. This fast-paced thriller delivers a compelling mystery, thought-provoking questions about existence, and brilliantly lifelike characters.(Reprinted with permission of Booklist, copyright 2014, American Library Association.)