An exuberant, bighearted novel about two teenage misfits who spectacularly collide one fateful summer and the art they make that changes their lives forever.
Well, Mr. Wilson, you have created a book that has me coming and going; dare I enter the world of teens. I thought my sixteen-year-old life was weird, a loss of sleep regularly, confrontations, morning, noon, and night, with all my siblings!! I didn’t, of course, realize that others were also going through this phase, some of it complicated and violent. Kevin Wilson has created a good book that reflects the lives that the two protagonists, Frankie and Zeke, endured.
Wilson only touched upon the physical damage suffered by girls; in fact, he made the hero of this story, a guy called Zeke; soft and gentle, he avoids confrontation and allows Frankie, the female, to take the lead in all that happens. To start, this is a painful coming-of-age story, Frankie and Zeke, sixteen years old, find each other, and with great care, they come together just as gradually as snow falling on your favorite sweater. What do these kids have in common? They reach out to each other; Zeke is an art student, and Frankie wants to become a writer, so they combine their talents and create a poster that includes a favorite poem of Frankie’s and cover the entire town with it so that they can show off their abilities, but there is a reaction to it by the young people of the city.
During the summer, Frankie is obsessed with the poem and continues to put up the posters, even when people are tearing them down, while Zeke eventually gets fed up with it and tries to distance himself from it. The end is painful, and the separation of our two protagonists is tough to take. The story comes to its conclusion twenty years later, and the book covers it successfully. This is a rare insight into the teen years; I must admit, it brought back a few memories of my own. An excellent read; I thoroughly enjoyed it.
Now available in bookstores
