Jude

November 22, 2004
Readers will need to suspend their disbelief as they begin Morgenroth's (Kill Me First
) dark tale of one teen's loss and redemption. In the crackerjack opening, 15-year-old Jude insists to detectives that he was watching TV while his drug-dealer father was shot dead in another room. But the tantalizing mystery of the teen's possible involvement is quickly solved and the rest of the novel gives way to an overly dramatic back story when a detective learns Jude's long-absent mother is the district attorney in the next town. The detectives alert the woman, who comes to the jail and explains to Jude that his father had kidnapped Jude as an infant. She takes her son home with her, but Jude's "dream... come true" does not last long. Harry, her police commissioner boyfriend and Jude's father's former partner, financed the kidnapping (for reasons that go unexplained) and then he sets Jude up to go to prison so Jude's mother (oblivious to the plan) can look tough on drugs and become mayor. In jail, Jude fights off adult males and wins their respect. Readers who can stomach the cockamamie plot will get to the big finish where the wet-behind-the-ears newspaper reporter—Jude's classmate at school—shows up at the jail and writes an exposé that forces Jude's mother to face the truth. Ages 12-up.

Starred review from November 1, 2004
Gr 8 Up-Fifteen-year-old Jude believes that his mother abandoned him at birth. When his heroin-dealer father is murdered, the authorities discover that he is the son of DA and mayoral candidate Anna Grady, and that he was kidnapped by his father at three weeks old. His mother welcomes him into her comfortable life and sends him to an exclusive prep school. When a schoolmate dies of an overdose, Jude, though innocent, is implicated. His mother's boyfriend, Harry, the deputy police commissioner, convinces him to take part in an elaborate charade to help Anna get elected on an anti-drug platform. Harry promises that once she's elected he will come forward with evidence that Jude is innocent. Instead, Jude is tried as an adult, sent to the state penitentiary for five years, and finds that Harry never meant to get him out at all. The plot is tight, deliberately paced, and full of delicious twists. Unlike many suspense novels, the characters are as thoroughly developed as the story. Jude, especially, is lovingly written-self-conscious and highly moral, with an angry toughness that balances him into believability. The dialogue, especially between Harry and Jude, is fluid, charged, and revelatory instead of expository. Only Anna is flat; she's merely a symbol of Jude's need for love. The somewhat tiny font makes the prose seem dense, but the story is quick and action packed enough to engage reluctant readers, especially older boys.-Johanna Lewis, New York Public Library

Copyright 2004 School Library Journal, LLC Used with permission.

Starred review from November 15, 2004
Gr. 9-12. In her YA debut, adult thriller writer Morgenroth tells the compelling story of Jude, 15, who is caught in a world of murder, drugs, and cover-ups that reaches into his Connecticut home and high school. The action is fast as Jude confronts the worst and best in himself, and the story reveals surprising secrets about people Jude thinks he can trust. Sworn to silence by the killer of his violent, drug-dealing dad, Jude moves into the wealthy home of the mother he has never known, and he switches to an elite private school. His mother is up for reelection as district attorney, and to save her reputation, he pleads guilty to a drug crime he didn't commit. He spends the next five years in prison, where he suffers constant abuse. Always he struggles to avoid being like his dad, and he longs for recognition from the mother who treats him like a stranger. There's a minimum of cursing and obscenity, but the dialogue still sounds pitch-perfect, and the intricacies of betrayal and discovery continue to the end of the novel. Readers will be caught by the thrilling mystery as well as Jude's fear, shame, anger, and search for home.(Reprinted with permission of Booklist, copyright 2004, American Library Association.)