Margie Fuston grew up in the woods of California where she made up fantasy worlds that always involved unicorns. In college, she earned undergraduate degrees in business and literature and a master’s in creative writing. Now she’s back in the woods and spends all her time wrangling a herd of cats and helping her nephews hunt ghosts, pond monsters, and mermaids.
In a desperate gambit to save her terminally ill father, a girl
goes looking for a vampire.
Victoria’s parents, believing she needs a break from the strain of
coping with her father’s imminent death, send her on a graduation
trip to New Orleans. She’d always planned on going with her father,
as they share a vampire obsession, both believing that a man who
briefly publicly claimed this identity a decade prior was the real
deal. Rather than a vacation, though, Victoria treats the trip as a
quest for vampiric immortality to save her father. Accompanying
Victoria is Henry, her childhood best friend–turned–subject of a
messy love triangle that left them estranged for some time. He
doesn’t believe in vampires but believes emotion-suppressing
Victoria will need him. Following the few clues she has, Victoria’s
led to charming, enigmatic Nicholas, who promises her what she
wants if she can keep up with his challenges and prove that she
really desires eternal life. The game takes them to many tourist
hot spots, though Victoria’s moments of fun are complicated by
grief spirals. Her emotional arc is all the more powerful for how
much she fights against her feelings. Her other emotional
complications come from her long history with Henry and an exciting
love triangle with Nicholas. In the end, though, she must tackle
hard truths head-on. Victoria’s White; Henry’s biracial
(Japanese/White) and brown-skinned Nicholas has curly black
hair.
Charmingly eclectic; becomes cohesive through its emotional
resonance.
*July 1, 2021*
Fuston’s emotionally charged debut mingles popular culture with the
pain of grief, diving deep into the well of vampire mythos and New
Orleans mystique. While preparing for art school, Victoria, who is
18 and white, is watching her father run out of treatments for
advanced pancreatic cancer. When her mother insists that she take a
few days away from the family, Victoria latches on to a last-ditch
effort: finding a vampire to turn her father before he can die.
Though she’s estranged from longtime friend and neighbor Henry,
who’s of Japanese descent, he travels with her to New Orleans,
where a vampire revealed himself—then disappeared—several years
back. There, Victoria embarks on the quest in earnest, armed with
the research that she and her father, longtime “vampire
connoisseurs,” have done over the years. When she meets
brown-skinned Nicholas, a purported vampire who’s willing to
entertain the thought of turning her, he assigns her a series of
tasks to push her out of her comfort zone. Told in Victoria’s
first-person voice and studded with quotations from vampire films,
this desperate journey takes its emotionally raw characters across
the Big Easy’s most well-known sites, along the way dipping into
faith and spirituality, romance, and the concept of surviving vs.
really living. Ages 12–up. Agent: Rebecca Podos, Rees
Literary. (Aug.)
*June 21, 2021*
Fuston, Margie. Vampires, Hearts & Other Dead Things. 352p. S. &
S./Margaret K. McElderry. Sept. 2021. Tr $18.99. ISBN
9781534474574.
Gr 8 Up–Senior year is a time for friends and celebrations, but
Victoria is consumed with thoughts of her dad. They share a special
bond over their appreciation of vampires, but he is sick with
untreatable pancreatic cancer. The two were supposed to go on a
trip to New Orleans, but instead, her father encourages her to go
with Henry, her estranged neighbor and childhood crush. Going
without her dad means accepting the fact that his death is
imminent. However, Victoria has an ulterior motive for going. She’s
hoping to find a vampire who will turn her into one, so she can
then turn her dad into a vampire, too. That way, he can live
forever. Instead, she meets Nicholas, a supposed vampire, who says
he’ll give her what she wants if she first proves her worth. Every
day he presents her a challenge that pushes her out of her comfort
zone and encourages her to experience life. Fuston takes readers on
a trip through muggy New Orleans in this debut novel. It is equal
parts heartbreaking and joyful, highlighting the lengths that one
will go in the name of love. Fuston takes the traditional view of
vampires and turns it on its head, associating them not with death,
but with life and positivity. Even readers who don’t have interest
in vampires and paranormal fantasy will find themselves drawn into
this story that’s really about embracing life at its core. VERDICT
For fans of Buffy, What We Do in the Shadows, and light romantic
tension.–Alicia Kalan, The Northwest Sch., Seattle
*August 2021*
 |
Ask a Question About this Product More... |
|
