Bound To Stay Bound

Booklist - 04/15/2021 *Starred Review* After they’re both sexually assaulted at a party, Ciela helps an unconscious boy get to the hospital, and after that, she wants to leave the night behind her. Formerly known as the pastry witch of San Juan Capistrano, Ciela inherited her bisabuela’s gift for knowing what kind of pan dulce customers need, but after the assault, that power disappears. Neighborhood trees vanish in the night. Certain objects begin turning into recklessly magical mirrored glass. And the boy, named Lock, enrolls at her school, only to be tormented by the same people responsible for their assaults. After noticing the shard of mirrored glass in Lock's eye, Ciela decides she won’t let it harm him, and as she helps, her gift for pan dulce gradually returns. Inspired by “The Snow Queen,” McLemore weaves an empowering story of two survivors healing together, exploring what consent looks like in every relationship, including with friends and family, after an assault. Their vulnerable, spellbinding story, colored with magic realism and achingly beautiful prose, is about healing after trauma, reclaiming your body and choices, and the empathetic understanding between survivors. As Ciela debates whether or not to tell Lock the truth about his assault, the pair navigate boundaries together. McLemore doesn’t shy away from the complexity and impact of trauma, but this is ultimately a transformative story about healing and finding the way back to your own magic. - Copyright 2021 Booklist.

School Library Journal - 05/01/2021 Gr 8 Up—In this novel inspired by their own experience, McLemore employs the device of magical realism as smoothly and artistically as protagonist Ciela creates pan dulce in her aunt's panadería. This first-person narrative opens like a fairy tale, recounting how her great-grandmother passed the gift of matching specific Mexican sweet bread to each client's needs. This ushers readers into the spring night of Ciela's junior year when she deposits an unknown white boy at the ER. Both of them were sexually assaulted, something that she cannot think about, much less talk about, so she mentally ascribes her own narrative to avoid splintering. Afterward, she begins to notice the metamorphosis of beautiful things in her life, like flowers and leaves, into glass shards, the largest of which is wedged in her heart. This is also when she realizes that her gift is missing. The story unfolds like a puzzle being slowly pieced together through rich, symbolic descriptions strengthened by equally symbolic Spanish translanguaging. Readers feel the agony of injustices committed on queer brown people, and powerless white people, and will be compelled to read deeply until the book's end, and then flip back to absorb more details. VERDICT A masterpiece intertwining painful teen realities involving injustices based on race, ethnicity, class, and gender with trauma and healing within loving, supportive families.—Ruth Quiroa, National Louis Univ., Lisle, IL - Copyright 2021 Publishers Weekly, Library Journal and/or School Library Journal used with permission.