The Strange and Beautiful Sorrows of Ava Lavender by Leslye Walton
Penguin Random House
Hardcover
Ages 13+
*MICHAEL’S PICK!*
My jaw fell open so often from reading this book, I finally had to keep it held shut with one hand while breathlessly flipping pages with the other. So why the jaw-dropping, you ask? Most importantly, from the beauty of this book’s characters, and its message, and its heart-wrenchingly PERFECT prose which reads like a strange (and beautiful) hybrid of the fairy tale and the epistolary novel. Second, from the horrors encapsulated here in – gasp! – a YA novel. There’s murder, there’s suicide, there are…other things, but why not, people?! You don’t have to be an adult to contemplate adult-size emotions. And, even after all that, your jaw will drop in response to unexpectedly lyrical moments (for example, one of the characters – a baker – forbade her daughter to handle the dough after it became apparent that her chronic heartache was starting to “infect” their customers). And, after all THAT, your jaw will continue to drop because it’s decided it likes the feeling and you can’t take that freedom away from it.
Foolish love appears to be the Roux family birthright, an ominous forecast for its most recent progeny, Ava Lavender. Ava—in all other ways a normal girl—is born with the wings of a bird. In a quest to understand her peculiar disposition and a growing desire to fit in with her peers, sixteen-year old Ava ventures into the wider world, ill-prepared for what she might discover and naive to the twisted motives of others.
Penguin Random House
Hardcover
Ages 13+
*MICHAEL’S PICK!*
My jaw fell open so often from reading this book, I finally had to keep it held shut with one hand while breathlessly flipping pages with the other. So why the jaw-dropping, you ask? Most importantly, from the beauty of this book’s characters, and its message, and its heart-wrenchingly PERFECT prose which reads like a strange (and beautiful) hybrid of the fairy tale and the epistolary novel. Second, from the horrors encapsulated here in – gasp! – a YA novel. There’s murder, there’s suicide, there are…other things, but why not, people?! You don’t have to be an adult to contemplate adult-size emotions. And, even after all that, your jaw will drop in response to unexpectedly lyrical moments (for example, one of the characters – a baker – forbade her daughter to handle the dough after it became apparent that her chronic heartache was starting to “infect” their customers). And, after all THAT, your jaw will continue to drop because it’s decided it likes the feeling and you can’t take that freedom away from it.
Foolish love appears to be the Roux family birthright, an ominous forecast for its most recent progeny, Ava Lavender. Ava—in all other ways a normal girl—is born with the wings of a bird. In a quest to understand her peculiar disposition and a growing desire to fit in with her peers, sixteen-year old Ava ventures into the wider world, ill-prepared for what she might discover and naive to the twisted motives of others.
Penguin Random House
Hardcover
Ages 13+
*MICHAEL’S PICK!*
My jaw fell open so often from reading this book, I finally had to keep it held shut with one hand while breathlessly flipping pages with the other. So why the jaw-dropping, you ask? Most importantly, from the beauty of this book’s characters, and its message, and its heart-wrenchingly PERFECT prose which reads like a strange (and beautiful) hybrid of the fairy tale and the epistolary novel. Second, from the horrors encapsulated here in – gasp! – a YA novel. There’s murder, there’s suicide, there are…other things, but why not, people?! You don’t have to be an adult to contemplate adult-size emotions. And, even after all that, your jaw will drop in response to unexpectedly lyrical moments (for example, one of the characters – a baker – forbade her daughter to handle the dough after it became apparent that her chronic heartache was starting to “infect” their customers). And, after all THAT, your jaw will continue to drop because it’s decided it likes the feeling and you can’t take that freedom away from it.
Foolish love appears to be the Roux family birthright, an ominous forecast for its most recent progeny, Ava Lavender. Ava—in all other ways a normal girl—is born with the wings of a bird. In a quest to understand her peculiar disposition and a growing desire to fit in with her peers, sixteen-year old Ava ventures into the wider world, ill-prepared for what she might discover and naive to the twisted motives of others.