Beautifully realized and a pleasure to read.
A young pianist seeks to understand himself while trying to gain a foothold in high society.
Seventeen-year-old Léon Delafosse is a piano prodigy, but he lacks the connections and know-how to find a patron and climb the social ladder in belle epoque Paris. Luckily—or, perhaps, unluckily—he meets the charismatic writer Marcel Proust, who introduces him to the fickle young Count Robert de Montesquiou. Robert could become his patron—and maybe more—if Léon plays his cards right, but Robert’s patronage comes with more perils than Léon expected. As Léon attempts to learn the social games of the upper classes, he also struggles with his attraction to other boys and what that means for his life and career. As related in the author’s note, the novel is based on the life of the real Léon Delafosse, a French pianist and composer who is largely unknown outside his wistful portrait by John Singer Sargent and his unfavorable fictionalized appearance in Proust’s Remembrance of Things Past. With these details and Delafosse’s and Proust’s letters as research material, the author creates an intimate, sensitive, gay coming-of-age story. Each description paints a sensual image of Léon’s world, from the rural idyll of his childhood home to his cramped Parisian apartment and Robert’s sumptuous town house. Knowledge of the era is not necessary to enjoy Léon’s story, but readers who do have that context will find even more to appreciate.
Beautifully realized and a pleasure to read. (Historical fiction. 13-18)Pub Date: Oct. 10, 2023
ISBN: 9780062982391
Page Count: 288
Publisher: Katherine Tegen/HarperCollins
Review Posted Online: Aug. 11, 2023
Kirkus Reviews Issue: Sept. 1, 2023
BOOK REVIEW
BOOK REVIEW
BOOK REVIEW
A compelling romance inhabited by complex and appealing characters.
When star hockey player Alec Barczewski’s estranged childhood friend, Dani Collins, moves to town, they end up in a mutually beneficial fake-dating relationship that reignites old feelings.
Following her parents’ divorce, Dani and her mom move in with Dani’s hockey legend grandfather in Southview, Minnesota, where she spent a month every summer as a child and where her friendship with Alec grew. Between visits, the two were pen pals, but they eventually fell out of touch. Despite some tensions over their loss of friendship, the high school seniors reconnect. Desperate to get off Harvard’s waitlist, Dani needs another extracurricular activity, while Alec—whose reputation took a hit when a photo of him holding a bong appeared on social media—is eager to improve his tarnished image for NHL scouts. The pair strike a deal: They’ll fake date, making Alec look like a stable guy whose academically gifted girlfriend is related to hockey royalty, and in exchange, he’ll get Dani a team manager position that will catch the eye of Harvard’s admissions officers. Eventually, complicated feelings about their past, stressful family relationships, and their brewing romance boil over. Romance fans will love the deliciously tension-filled scenes between Alec and Dani, who are believable friends with heavy demands weighing on them. They feel like real teenagers, and readers will enjoy rooting for them as the well-paced story unfolds. Main characters present white.
A compelling romance inhabited by complex and appealing characters. (Romance. 14-18)Pub Date: Sept. 30, 2025
ISBN: 9781665921268
Page Count: 448
Publisher: Simon & Schuster
Review Posted Online: Aug. 2, 2025
Kirkus Reviews Issue: Sept. 1, 2025
SEEN & HEARD
A sparse, beautifully drawn story about a teen discovering her heritage.
In this YA graphic novel, an alienated Métis girl learns about her people’s Canadian history.
Métis teenager Echo Desjardins finds herself living in a home away from her mother, attending a new school, and feeling completely lonely as a result. She daydreams in class and wanders the halls listening to a playlist of her mother’s old CDs. At home, she shuts herself up in her room. But when her history teacher begins to lecture about the Pemmican Wars of early 1800s Saskatchewan, Echo finds herself swept back to that time. She sees the Métis people following the bison with their mobile hunting camp, turning the animals’ meat into pemmican, which they sell to the Northwest Company in order to buy supplies for the winter. Echo meets a young girl named Marie, who introduces Echo to the rhythms of Métis life. She finally understands what her Métis heritage actually means. But the joys are short-lived, as conflicts between the Métis and their rivals in the Hudson Bay Company come to a bloody head. The tragic history of her people will help explain the difficulties of the Métis in Echo’s own time, including those of her mother and the teen herself. Accompanied by dazzling art by Henderson (A Blanket of Butterflies, 2017, etc.) and colorist Yaciuk (Fire Starters, 2016, etc.), this tale is a brilliant bit of time travel. Readers are swept back to 19th-century Saskatchewan as fully as Echo herself. Vermette’s (The Break, 2017, etc.) dialogue is sparse, offering a mostly visual, deeply contemplative juxtaposition of the present and the past. Echo’s eventual encounter with her mother (whose fate has been kept from readers up to that point) offers a powerful moment of connection that is both unexpected and affecting. “Are you…proud to be Métis?” Echo asks her, forcing her mother to admit, sheepishly: “I don’t really know much about it.” With this series opener, the author provides a bit more insight into what that means.
A sparse, beautifully drawn story about a teen discovering her heritage.Pub Date: March 15, 2018
ISBN: 978-1-55379-678-7
Page Count: 48
Publisher: HighWater Press
Review Posted Online: Feb. 28, 2018
Kirkus Reviews Issue: May 1, 2018
Review Program: Kirkus Indie
BOOK REVIEW
BOOK REVIEW
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