YA chillers
Well, book fans, I've hit the decadent part of March break. I've gotten quite a bit ahead on homework. No real progress on housework but that would require getting off the sofa which Tobago is not ready for me to do. Recall I recently learned about a trilogy of Maureen Johnson's Stevie narratives? I was able to acquire them all by inter library loan. Now I have not only the time and feline companionship, but the candy. So I will indulge myself and share what I discover with you.
"Stevie Bell had a simple desire: she wanted to be standing over a dead body.
She didn't want to kill people--far from it. She wanted to be the person who found out why the body was dead, that's all."
By now you may have guessed that Stevie, protagonist of Truly Devious, The Vanishing Stair, and The Hand on the Wall, is not your typical teenage girl. And she does not attend a typical American high school. Ellingham Academy was founded by a tycoon in the 1930s to provide personalized learning experiences to rich and poor kids alike. Albert Ellingham had located it on the secluded top of a Vermont mountain. No expenses were spared to make it the epitome of lavish eccentricity. Think the setting of the Harry Potter movies minus the wizards and ghosts...
...actually there might be a ghost or two haunting the place. Shortly after the school opened its founder/headmaster was sent a bizarre poem detailing a number of methods of homicide. Days later his wife and toddler daughter were abducted in a ransome scheme. His wife turned up dead in a lake. No trace of their beloved child was ever found. A student, maybe one who had seen too much, also met a tragic fate. Over the intervening decades detectives, both professional and amateur, had failed to find out what happened and many people claiming to be little Alice, the missing child heiress, had been proven to be frauds...
...which is why Stevie finds herself on a mountain in Vermont. Ellingham has a unique way of student selection. Rather than going by private school standards like test scores, grades, and recommendations, they have prospective students write letters about their passions. They're looking for kids who are strongly committed to individual passions...
...like Stevie, a budding detective who has read everything she can about the school's tragic past. She is determined to solve the mystery of the century, the one that has stumped even professionals, before she graduates. Not only is this quite ambitious...
...it has the potential to be deadly. When Stevie starts investigating her classmates start dying...
...so if you'd find a three volume chiller that segues between past and present, contains violent deaths in both time periods, and takes place in a unique and quirky setting to be the cat's pajamas...
...you're going to love the Truly Devious trilogy.
On a purrrsonal note, there's another reason that I love the trilogy and its two sequels. Stevie has anxiety just as I do. It feels amazing to encounter a character who stresses in situations that other people seem to glide through and has panic attacks. We tend to think of literary representation in terms of race, gender identity, and sexual orientation. But now I'm starting to see books with neurodivergent main characters. In my mind that is a very good thing. (Jules)
That is one of the reasons she needs me. (Tobago)
A great big shout out goes out to you, dear readers, with best wishes for a wonderful weekend.
Tobago and Jules Hathaway
Sent from my U.S.Cellular© Smartphone
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