Description
Product Description
A poignant, deeply funny coming-of-age story about first love, first loss, and the power of history to give life meaning.
* "[An] impressive debut...
John Green fans will gobble this one up." --
Kirkus, starred review
History buff Ray knows everything about the peculiar legends and lore of his rural Connecticut hometown. Burgerville's past is riddled with green cow sightings and human groundhogs, but the most interesting thing about the present is the new girl--we'll call her Jane Doe.
Inscrutable, cool, and above all mysterious, Jane seems as determined to hide her past as Ray is to uncover it. As fascination turns to friendship and then to something more, Ray is certain he knows Jane's darkest, most painful secrets and Jane herself--from past to present. But when the unthinkable happens, Ray is forced to acknowledge that perhaps history can only tell us so much.
Mixing humor with heartache, this is an unmissable coming-of-age story from an exciting new voice in YA.
Review
★ "
[An] impressive debut...Suffused with quirky humor and equal parts life-affirming and heartbreaking,
John Green fans will gobble this one up." —
Kirkus, starred review
"Readers looking for a moving, realistic portrayal of depression will appreciate this
exceptional debut." —
Publishers Weekly
"A
powerful debut with a story
for fans of John Green and Jennifer Niven… guaranteed to tug at your heartstrings.” —
BuzzFeed
"A YA triple threat...
genuine, believable, and relatable." —
Hello Giggles"Mixing humor with heartache, this is
an unmissable coming-of-age story from an exciting new voice in YA." —
BookBub"A story of first love, heartbreak, and the darkness that is depression...
an absolute must-read.” —
Brightly
About the Author
Michael Belanger is a debut young adult author and high school history teacher. He is a member of the Westport Writers' Workshop and faculty advisor to
Greenwitch, a high school literary magazine that has published talented young writers--including Truman Capote--for over a hundred years. He currently lives in Connecticut.
Excerpt. © Reprinted by permission. All rights reserved.
***This excerpt is from an advance uncorrected copy proof*** Copyright © 2018 Michael Belanger
61 DAYS AFTER
JANE DOE
I don’t have cancer and both of my parents are still alive. I just thought I’d get that out of the way so you’re not disappointed. While we’re at it, I might as well tell you that I’m not a vampire, I don’t have magical powers, and the closest I’ve ever come to fighting a war against an evil dystopian government was in a video game.
Now that you’re no longer expecting a story about orphaned vampires fighting an oligarchy of terminally ill wizards—although come to think of it, that does sound pretty cool—I’ll tell you why I’m writing this. It’s not to “document my feelings” or “look for self-destructive patterns,” like my therapist, Rich, suggested. I guess you could say I’m a history buff, but don’t worry, this isn’t a story about the Civil War or little houses on the prairie. History has enough stories already, things way more interesting than anything I could make up—the epic battles, rumors about people playing games with severed human heads, all of the unsolved mysteries involving rocks and ritual sacrifices. I know people say history repeats itself, I just hope I’m not around when it does.
The truth is, I’m writing this mostly to help me understand everything that happened over the past year between my (ex) girlfriend Jane and me. When you read as much history as I do, you start to wish real life also had textbooks, the kind with illustrated chronologies and “Did You Know?” sections that make everything so simple and easy to understand. Any good historian knows that the past is a lot more complex than cause-and-effect charts and corny acronyms make it out to be; but Jane, a person more complicated than any revolution, more confusing than any war, and more life changing than any invention