Bound To Stay Bound

Booklist - 05/01/2020 For years, 12-year-old Abby’s life in Moose Junction, Wisconsin, has been stable and happy. Her eldest sister, Blair, was expected to whiz through her Joffrey Ballet audition. Instead, anorexia has undermined her health, derailed her plans, and shaken the family. While Blair’s away at a recovery program, the town prepares to become ground zero for viewing an upcoming solar eclipse, and astronomer Leo Lacamoire reserves one of the family’s lakeside cabins. Abby, who loves astronomy, agrees to join his clandestine quest to recover an extraordinary telescope. Arrogant and self-centered, he’s used to having his way, but Abby has her own agenda. The narrative is challenging in a couple of ways. First, its nonlinear structure intersperses present-day chapters with others set at different points in the past. And second, Abby tells readers on page two that she lies, though 100 pages into her involving first-person narrative, it’s easy to forget that she may be an unreliable narrator. While Lacamoire’s backstory is unconvincing, the family’s anorexia experience and Abby’s relationships with her two sisters are well drawn. A promising first novel. - Copyright 2020 Booklist.