Description
Seventeen-year-old Alba is an aspiring comic-book artist, pastry enthusiast and eternal optimist. She thinks life in her tiny town is awesome (if predictable) and she never wants it to change.
Unfortunately Alba's just finished Year 12 - so the only thing she can predict is that everything's going to change. Even so, Alba didn't see the end of the world coming. Apart from a questionable television psychic, no-one did. And for some reason, the world seems to be taking this guy seriously.
As the tiny town is besieged by doomsday enthusiasts, Alba's life is thrown into chaos. The childhood friend she thought was gone forever unexpectedly reappears; the boy who has been her best friend forever is determined to leave; and even her latest comic book creation, Cinnamon Girl, is out of control.
It could be the very last summer of Alba's life, but impending Armageddon might turn out to be the least of her problems.
Review
After the enormous success of Melissa Keil’s first novel, Life In Outer Space, I was eagerly anticipating reading this novel and it is equally wonderful.
She again gets right inside the character and makes us feel like we are sharing their journey.
In this book, our main character Alba is about to finish high school but she doesn't want her life to change - she enjoys her friends and the small country town that she lives in. She enjoys hanging out with Grady, her best friend from forever who should probably be more than her friend.
Life takes an unexpected turn when a small time, late-night TV personality announces, in Nostradamus fashion, that the end of the world will occur on New Year’s Eve but that their small town will be spared. The prediction causes weird and wonderful characters to begin arriving in town and their landscape changes dramatically.
One of the arrivals is Daniel, who was Alba and Grady’s third wheel until they were ten. Daniel has been living in the city ever since and he even has a regular spot on a poorly produced and low rating TV drama.
Daniel can’t believe that nothing has changed and raises questions about their future. But will they even see New Year? And will Alba realise her destiny - both with Grady, and also with her artistic future? Will she get the chance to develop the incredible comic talent that created Cinnamon Girl?
A fantastic story of growth, trust and friendship that 15+ girls will love.
Reviewed by Rob
