Overview

Two isolated teens struggle against their complicated lives to find a true connection in this ""timely and timeless"" (Kirkus Reviews, starred review) debut novel about first love and the wreckage of growing up. Lily is returning to her privileged Manhattan high school after a harrowing end to her sophomore year and it's not pretty. She hates chemistry and her spiteful lab partner, her friends are either not speaking to her or suffocating her with concerned glances, and nothing seems to give her joy anymore. Worst of all, she can't escape her own thoughts about what drove her away from everyone in the first place. Enter Dari (short for Dariomauritius), the artistic and mysterious transfer student, adept at cutting class. Not that he'd rather be at home with his domineering Trinidadian father. Dari is everything that Lily needs: bright, creative, honest, and unpredictable. And in a school where no one really stands out, Dari finds Lily's sensitivity and openness magnetic. Their attraction ignites immediately, and for the first time in what feels like forever, Lily and Dari find happiness in each other. In twenty-first-century New York City, the fact that Lily is white and Dari is black shouldn't matter that much, but nothing's as simple as it seems. When tragedy becomes reality, can friendship survive even if romance cannot?

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9781481459471

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Reviews

When Lily returns to her Manhattan high school in the fall, she is met with disgust and revulsion from her longtime classmates. They all know what she did the previous school year, and their disdain only adds to Lily s distress, since she s still emotionally paralyzed by the experience and unable to take refuge even in her beloved music. Then she notices a new kid, Dari, who keeps his head in his art to avoid his difficult home situation. As they grow closer, they find some comfort in each other, and if this was a predictable novel, their romance would heal all their wounds. But debut novelist Corthron eschews the easy path, especially when Lily, who s white, displays careless, dangerous naivete when Dari, who s black, faces an ultimately tragic interaction with police officers. While the plot at times verges on melodrama, its focus on racial injustice becomes the most powerful of the novel s subplots. Hand to fans of Kekla Magoon s How It Went Down (2014) or Stephen Emond s Bright Lights, Dark Nights (2015). Diane Colson--Booklist November 1, 2016

When Lily returns to her Manhattan high school in the fall, she is met with disgust and revulsion from her longtime classmates. They all know what she did the previous school year, and their disdain only adds to Lily's distress, since she's still emotionally paralyzed by the experience and unable to take refuge even in her beloved music. Then she notices a new kid, Dari, who keeps his head in his art to avoid his difficult home situation. As they grow closer, they find some comfort in each other, and if this was a predictable novel, their romance would heal all their wounds. But debut novelist Corthron eschews the easy path, especially when Lily, who's white, displays careless, dangerous naivete when Dari, who's black, faces an ultimately tragic interaction with police officers. While the plot at times verges on melodrama, its focus on racial injustice becomes the most powerful of the novel's subplots. Hand to fans of Kekla Magoon's How It Went Down (2014) or Stephen Emond's Bright Lights, Dark Nights (2015). -- Diane Colson--Booklist -November 1, 2016 -

Author Information

Kara Lee Corthron is an author, playwriter, and TV writer based in Los Angeles. She's the author of The Truth of Right Now, winner of the Parent's Choice Gold Award, and Daughters of Jubilation. Her plays, including What Are You Worth?, Welcome to Fear City, AliceGraceAnon, and Holly Down in Heaven, have been performed across the US, and she writes for the TV thrillers You (Netflix) and The Flight Attendant (HBO Max). She's a multiyear MacDowell Fellow and a resident playwright at New Dramatists.

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