Summer Skin

March 19, 2018
Australian author Eagar (Raw Blue) offers a YA novel about college life that, though it reflects the Australian university system, will resonate with college readers in the U.S. Eagar’s characters, each of whom has a strong personality, struggle realistically with fears and vulnerabilities, especially in the areas of sex, romance, and love. Jess and her fellow Unity College women friends are angry at the men at Knights College for a sex video of Jess’s friend Farren they made without permission. The women swear revenge against Knights men and cut them off entirely as potential romantic and hookup partners. But when Jess meets Mitch, a Knights College student who is grieving the loss of his best friend, the two are immediately attracted to each another and Jess struggles with powerful resentments toward what she believes Mitch represents. Eagar’s portrayal of college life is a dark, believable one. The unlikely love story that arises from the antagonistic campus climate comes across as more strained than organic, but Eager’s exploration of gendered and sexual power dynamics is timely and unflinchingly honest. Ages 17–up. Agent: Catherine Drayton, InkWell Management.