She and her sister are estranged from their parents, particularly her mother, who feels betrayed by the lives her daughters are living. Jack does her best to keep her boyfriend Luke happy but receives little in the way of reciprocation. She is a high school dropout who lives with her older sister Trudy, a dropout as well. Main Street has a beauty parlor, a pub, an OTB, and a run-down convenience store called Bent Bowl Spoon, where 17-year-old Jacklin works. Gr 9 Up-The town of Mobius does not have a lot going for it. This fits perfectly into the category of crossover books, because, while teens might initially applaud some of Jack's choices, adults will see all the ways she's going wrong.-Cooper, Ilene Copyright 2016 Booklist The drone of the ever-present bugs is as palpable as the emptiness of the lives and landscapes. Wakefield is a precise and perceptive writer, engaging all the reader's senses. But when she loses her job, Jack tries to change things up again. She finds an enigmatic fellow living alone in the forest, and develops a friendship and perhaps more with Jeremiah, a former neighbor. Then a few new players wander into her life. In fact, her town, Mobius, is a small, sad, defeated place that is as barren as Jack's life. She makes ends meet by working in a convenience store, sometimes helping the owner with his father, who has Alzheimer's. She's quit school, moved in with her older sister, and has sex once a week with a guy who has little interest in her. In this Australian import set sometime in the past at least before cell phones 17-year-old Jacklin thinks she has taken the reins of her life. Even so, readers who let themselves sink into Wakefield's descriptions of small-town life, its constraints, and frustrations will enjoy following Jack as she searches for meaning, finding love and purpose in the unlikeliest people. Jack does her job, loses said job, fights with Trudy, hooks up with a 21-year-old, learns to drive, has philosophical conversations with a drifter named Pope, struggles to reconcile with her estranged parents, and has other small adventures, but the events don't really coalesce to lend a driving force to the narrative. When it comes to the malaise and stagnation of life in Mobius, Wakefield's writing is unflinchingly honest, though the story lacks tension. Mobius is about as depressed a town as it gets (Jack describes it as "a populated dead end, a wrong turn, a sleepy hollow"), and the story meanders among inhabitants who aren't sure what to do with themselves. Author NotesĪustralian author Wakefield (Friday Never Leaving) sets this reflective novel in the desolate town of Mobius, where 17-year-old Jacklin "Jack" Bates has moved in with her older sister, Trudy. Only, sometimes the hardest part of starting over isn't choosing a 's figuring out how to take that first step forward. When Jack faces losing Jeremiah, she searches for a way to repair their relationship-beginning with the other broken pieces in her life. But even as a fragile romance builds between them, Jack knows deep down that she can't stay in limbo forever. Together, over an endless summer, Jack and Jeremiah fix up the abandoned drive-in theater at the edge of town. And then there's Jeremiah, the boy next door with a kind, listening ear and plenty of troubles of his own. She strikes up an unlikely friendship with Pope, a lost soul camping in the forest behind her house. And when Jack loses her job and the boy she loves breaks her heart, she becomes desperate for distractions. But Jack quickly discovers her sister isn't the same person she used to be. "Jack") believes the only way to soar beyond her life is to drop out of school and move in with her free-spirited sister, Trudy. Seventeen-year-old Jacklin maneuvers her way through a summer of family drama and first-and second-loves in this gorgeous, lyrical novel from the author of Friday Never Leaving.
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