Dead End

November 1, 2011

Gr 10 Up-Dru Weiben, 16, and Gina King, 17, are in love as evidenced by their passionate sex life, described in raw detail from the first page. Dru comes from a troubled family; his brother is in jail and his drunk father drove off a bridge to his death. But Dru is the star of the wrestling team, and he is determined to be better than the assumptions people make about him. Gina also comes from a struggling family. The Aldersons, the local power family, own half the county in Nebraska and apparently half the law-enforcement officers as well. When the self-indulgent only son of this family rapes Gina and, in a tragic turn of events, ends up dead, the two young lovers go on the run. The corruption in the police force drives readers to believe that there is little hope for them, and eventually they are proven right in this modern tale with a Shakespearean ending. There are some good characters, and the sometimes-brutal passages will attract some readers, but a better choice might be Simone Elkeles's Perfect Chemistry (Walker, 2009).-Jake Pettit, Thompson Valley High School, Loveland, CO

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