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Summary
Summary
From bestselling author Natalie Standiford, an amazing, touching story of two friends navigating the dark waters of their senior year.
New to town, Beatrice is expecting her new best friend to be one of the girls she meets on the first day. But instead, the alphabet conspires to seat her next to Jonah, aka Ghost Boy, a quiet loner who hasn't made a new friend since third grade. Something about him, though, gets to Bea, and soon they form an unexpected friendship. It's not romance, exactly - but it's definitely love. Still, Bea can't quite dispel Jonah's gloom and doom - and as she finds out his family history, she understands why. Can Bea help Jonah? Or is he destined to vanish?
Author Notes
Natalie Standiford is the author of HOW TO SAY GOODBYE IN ROBOT, CONFESSIONS OF THE SULLIVAN SISTERS, and THE SECRET TREE. She is originally from Maryland, but now lives in New York City and plays in the all-YA-author band Tiger Beat.
Reviews (5)
Publisher's Weekly Review
By the time she's a senior, Beatrice Szabo is an expert at emotional detachment, having trained herself not to consider "the houses we lived in as my house, or the street we lived on as our street." Her biology professor father, constantly following grant money to new positions, has now brought the family to Baltimore. Bea's former best friend-her mother-is coming unhinged, miserable about moving and her deteriorating marriage. So it comes as a surprise to Bea that at her new, small private school she forms a near-instant bond with Jonah Tate, a boy with a past so tragic his withdrawal was probably inevitable. Bea and Jonah's relationship is platonic but intense-two kids drawn to each other by joint recognition of the intelligence behind the robotic facades they wear to get through high school. Bea's darkly comic sensibility carries the story, and Standiford's minor characters-including the over-50 callers on an all-night radio show Bea and Jonah listen to faithfully-provide more humor. There's no happy ending, but that, too, will give this first novel resonance with anybody on the fringe. Ages 13-up. (Oct.) (c) Copyright PWxyz, LLC. All rights reserved
Horn Book Review
When Bea's professor father takes a new position, she starts her senior year "in a new city at a small private school where all the other kids had known each other since they were three." Bea's wooden compliance with the move (and life's imperfections in general) leads her mother to dub her a robot. Still, Bea manages to connect with Jonah, a prickly fellow insomniac, while also making inroads into the (refreshingly sympathetic) popular crowd. Bea and Jonah bond over a late-night radio show, but their friendship truly starts when Jonah discovers that his brain-damaged twin brother, who supposedly died in a car crash with their mother when the boys were in third grade, is actually alive and institutionalized -- and Jonah enlists Bea's help in bringing his brother back into his life. Standiford realistically depicts both the social intricacies of a small school and the emotional nuances of two dysfunctional families. Her characters are unusually true-to-life as, caught up in the intensity of their present, they fumble toward fully formed identities and fulfilling relationships. From HORN BOOK, (c) Copyright 2010. The Horn Book, Inc., a wholly owned subsidiary of Media Source, Inc. No redistribution permitted.
Booklist Review
The hot pink cover featuring a telephone dangling by the cord fairly screams teen romance! but might give the wrong impression of this quirky novel. Bea, the new girl in a school where most of the kids have known each other since kindergarten, befriends Jonah, an outcast deemed Ghost Boy after a cruel middle-school prank. She finds herself torn between normal highschool activities and spending time with Jonah, listening to the bizarre but engaging Night Light, a radio show haunted by some of Baltimore's loneliest weirdos. Theirs is not a budding romance, but a tumultuous, hot-and-cold friendship; they love each other, but should never even think about a relationship. Credit is due to Standiford for the delicate portrayal of Jonah's home life, which could have veered into soap-opera territory, especially with the reappearance of his long-thought-dead, mentally disabled twin brother. The heart of this novel is neither cold and metallic nor full of romance and delusion. Instead, it's very human.--Jones, Courtney Copyright 2009 Booklist
School Library Journal Review
Gr 9 Up-Beatrice Szabo is having a tough year in this novel (Scholastic, 2009) by Natalie Standiford. Her father's job has caused a move-again-and Bea must start her senior year at a small private school in Baltimore. Her parents' marriage is disintegrating and her mother's bizarre behavior has become alarming. To deal with the stress, the teenager shuts off her emotions and refuses to feel too happy or too sad about anything. Her mother calls her a robot. At school, Bea finds a soul mate in Jonah, the outcast of the senior class. He earned the nickname Ghost Boy after his disabled twin brother died in a car accident and Jonah retreated into himself. Jonah introduces Bea to "Night Light," a local late night call-in radio show, and the pair spends nights listening in on the lonely eccentrics who call in. The story takes an intense turn when Jonah discovers that his brother didn't actually die in the accident but is living in an institution. This character driven novel is beautifully narrated by Kate Rudd who uses an acerbic tone perfectly suited to Beatrice. The audio format especially shines during the "Night Light" portions of the story. A dozen different narrators are used as callers for the radio show, and their quirky voices vibrate with personality. The smattering of harsh language makes this a better choice for libraries serving older teens It's refreshing to find a YA story that focuses on a platonic friendship between a boy and girl, and teens will be hooked.-Tricia Melgaard, Centennial Middle School, Broken Arrow, OK (c) Copyright 2011. Library Journals LLC, a wholly owned subsidiary of Media Source, Inc. No redistribution permitted.
Kirkus Review
Surprising everyone at their private school, a sardonic loner befriends the new girl in this unusual story of an intense platonic relationship between two misfits. Dubbed a robot by her emotionally unstable mother after she fails to manifest sufficient heartbreak over the death of their gerbil, Bea meets pale, withdrawn Jonah, maliciously called "Ghost Boy" by their peers. Almost immediately, she realizes that she has more in common with Jonah than with the catty, insular girls that surround her and begins to rely increasingly heavily on him even as she discovers more about his tragically strange past. Standiford has crafted a darkly whimsical tale filled with details that will be recognizable to teens truly existing on the fringe, complete with references to John Waters films and outsider musician Daniel Johnston. Bea's original first-person voice will draw readers in, and the unexpected plot will keep them engaged. A decidedly purposeful not-love story, this has all the makings of a cult hit with a flavor similar to Stephen Chbosky's The Perks of Being a Wallflower (1999). (Fiction. 12 up) Copyright Kirkus Reviews, used with permission.
