Black Helicopters

Starred review from January 7, 2013
This brief but razor-sharp novel from Woolston (Catch & Release) is as unpredictable as the bomb strapped to the chest of the girl at its center, 15-year-old Valkyrie White. Raised in isolation in remote Montana, Valkyrie was four years old when her mother was killed tending the garden after black helicopters passed overhead. She and her brother are brought up by their father, who believes in being a free and free-thinking person, and who is happy to deliver violent messages for a price, such as targeting an “activist” judge. It’s a path that, following more tragedies, finds Valkyrie dressed as an ordinary girl, an explosive hidden beneath her hoodie, riding in a U-Haul truck headed out into the world. Valkyrie makes every word count in her narration, which makes sense coming from a girl who grew up with such rules as “Never waste an opportunity to conserve resources.” The ambiguities and of-the-moment realism of Woolston’s story muddy the lines between right and wrong, while giving provocative insight into the mindset of those who see modern government as an unnecessary evil. Ages 14–up. Agent: Sarah Davies, Greenhouse Literary Agency.

April 1, 2013

Gr 9 Up-Valley and Bo's orders from their father were very clear: if they hear or see a helicopter, they are to run and hide. The rest of the country does not believe that the government is killing American citizens, but Valley and her family do. That's why her father came up with a plan to wake up the rest of the country. But something went wrong, and the black helicopters killed him. The story is told in alternating chapters from when they were with their father, then on their own, and, finally, living with a group of young terrorists who base their faith on Norse mythology. The richness of this book lies within the characters Valley and Bo meet across the Montana landscape, such as a group of young girls smuggled into Canada after being impregnated, and Eric, the teen whom Valley takes hostage to complete her final mission. Valley is smart and committed although misguided. This is a fast-paced story that builds suspense till the abrupt ending that will leave readers guessing whether or not Valley succeeded. This is a good book to recommend to teens who enjoy reading about the strange underbelly of society.-Erik Carlson, White Plains Public Library, NY

Copyright 2013 School Library Journal, LLC Used with permission.

Starred review from February 15, 2013
A chilling exploration of the life, motivations and strategies of a young American suicide bomber. Valkyrie (nee Valley) White is on a mission to wake up everyone. Her statement of purpose recorded and media-ready, she departs the survivalist camp where she and her brother Bo live, but when her driver detonates their truck bomb too early, Valkyrie sets off on her own to complete the mission. Through brief chapters alternating between the past and present, readers learn about Valley and Bo's childhood in Montana's backwoods, where their Da trained them to be self-sufficient and deeply wary of the world outside their land. After Valley and Bo's mother, Mabby, dies in what they believe was a black-helicopter attack authorized by Those People in the government, Da insists that the children learn paramilitary and bomb-building skills along with chess and how to read. In the present, Valkyrie uses Da's lessons to manipulate a teenage boy into driving to an opportune place for her to detonate her vest. Woolston's slow, tense revelation of the full horror of what the adults in Valkyrie's life have wrought in and through her is breathtaking. Readers who may have previously associated suicide bombers with religious fanaticism will be fascinated by Valkyrie's totally secular but equally single-minded devotion to anti-government rhetoric and revenge. Harrowing and unforgettable. (Fiction. 14-18)

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March 15, 2013
Grades 9-12 Woolston (The Freak Observer, 2010; Catch & Release, 2012) further sharpens her pen with a short novel that is daring on multiple fronts. Fifteen-year-old Valkyrie and her brother, Bo, live so far off the grid that they don't even technically exist. For years they have worked alongside their survivalist father, part of a secret network of free people who proudly take on paid missions for anarchist or paranoid clients: building bombs, illegally transporting humans across borders, and so on. If it sounds vague, it isWoolston limits us to Vally's proud, brainwashed perspective as the narrative intercuts between the siblings' initial struggle to continue their father's cause after his death and Vally's current and final mission: explode the bombs laced to her chest to deliver a last message to humankind. Much of the book is a puzzle of uncertain motives, ambiguous characters, and ominously childlike musings ( We fix clocks. We wear socks. We fix clocks while we wear socks ). But Woolston's resistance to standard redemption tropes is courageous, making this a periodically confounding but impressively focused work.(Reprinted with permission of Booklist, copyright 2013, American Library Association.)