July 1, 2018
After her uncle belatedly signs the guardianship papers, Grace, 17, moves into his home, the site of a brutal sexual assault she's never disclosed.Before her father's fatal heart attack, Grace lived with him in Tampa, spending summers with her uncle, Rusty, in New Harbor. Her friend Janna still lives next door--and so does Janna's brother, Owen. Two years ago, Grace was in love with Owen; they'd been kissing in Grace's room when she blacked out, having taken a sleeping pill to get some rest after an exhausting illness. Hours later, she awoke to find she'd been raped. Her father's death followed, and Grace entered foster care. She's kept the assault--for which she blames Owen--secret and hasn't seen or spoken to him or Janna since. Grace copes with the trauma by stealing wallets from men she's caught leering at women (she keeps the wallets and their contents, donating the cash to charity). Unable to avoid Owen and his family, she confronts him over the assault. But was he really responsible? Other suspects abound--Rusty and a couple of dozen male friends were partying drunkenly in the house that night. Puzzlingly inconsistent characters, their motivations hard (or impossible) to fathom, burden an often far-fetched plot; threads abandoned middevelopment further erode credibility. The book follows a white default.Intermittently engrossing but ultimately disappointing--a missed opportunity to explore a timely topic. (author's note) (Fiction. 14-18)

COPYRIGHT(2018) Kirkus Reviews, ALL RIGHTS RESERVED.

July 1, 2019
Two years after her father's death, Grace moves in with her estranged uncle, whom she had previously spent summers with. Returning to New Harbor means Grace also must come to terms with a hazy memory of rape that occurred there. Friendship and first love mingle awkwardly with sexual assault and Grace's devastating realization regarding her abuser. Still, Grace's journey is ultimately hopeful. Includes resources for survivors.

(Copyright 2019 by The Horn Book, Incorporated, Boston. All rights reserved.)

September 1, 2018

Gr 9 Up-It's been two years since Grace's father died and her Uncle Rusty disappeared, leaving her in foster care. Now that Rusty is finally ready to become her legal guardian, Grace is returning to New Harbor, the quaint beach town where she spent her childhood summers and the site of a traumatic assault that Grace can barely remember. The last time she and her father stayed with Uncle Rusty, Grace remembers kissing her boyfriend, Owen, in her bedroom, telling him she didn't want to go any further, and nothing else (she had taken an Ambien to counter illness-induced insomnia.) In the morning, Grace woke up and realized she had been raped. Shortly after, her father had a heart attack, and Grace tried to forget about her assault, stealing the wallets of male strangers and donating their money to charity as a coping strategy. In the present, Grace has mostly learned to deal with her grief over her father's death, but she must now come to terms with Rusty's abandonment, her estrangement from Owen's sister and her childhood best friend Janna, and, crucially, the mystery of what really happened that night. Grace's humorous narration will draw some readers in, and the beach town setting, while not particularly fleshed out, also appeals. Unfortunately, implausible plotting undermines this examination of grief and the aftereffects of sexual abuse. Characters don't act consistently, and some narrative threads are never satisfyingly resolved. VERDICT An additional purchase where beach reads with weighty emotional themes and a touch of melodrama are popular.-Grace Dwyer, New York Public Library

Copyright 2018 School Library Journal, LLC Used with permission.