Copy Boy - Libroj.org

256 paĝoj

Lingvo: English

Eldonita je 22-a de decembro 2020 de She Writes Press.

ISBN:: 978-1-63152-697-8

(1 recenzo)

Jane’s a very brave boy. And a very difficult girl. She’ll become a remarkable woman, an icon of her century, but that’s a long way off.

Not my fault, she thinks, dropping a bloody crowbar in the irrigation ditch after Daddy. She steals Momma’s Ford and escapes to Depression-era San Francisco, where she fakes her way into work as a newspaper copy boy. Everything’s looking up. She’s climbing the ladder at the paper, winning validation, skill, and connections with the artists and thinkers of her day. But then Daddy reappears on the paper’s front page, his arm around a girl who’s just been beaten into a coma one block from Jane’s newspaper―hit in the head with a crowbar.

Jane’s got to find Daddy before he finds her, and before everyone else finds her out. She’s got to protect her invented identity. This is what she thinks she wants. It’s definitely …

Jane’s a very brave boy. And a very difficult girl. She’ll become a remarkable woman, an icon of her century, but that’s a long way off.

Not my fault, she thinks, dropping a bloody crowbar in the irrigation ditch after Daddy. She steals Momma’s Ford and escapes to Depression-era San Francisco, where she fakes her way into work as a newspaper copy boy. Everything’s looking up. She’s climbing the ladder at the paper, winning validation, skill, and connections with the artists and thinkers of her day. But then Daddy reappears on the paper’s front page, his arm around a girl who’s just been beaten into a coma one block from Jane’s newspaper―hit in the head with a crowbar.

Jane’s got to find Daddy before he finds her, and before everyone else finds her out. She’s got to protect her invented identity. This is what she thinks she wants. It’s definitely what her dead brother wants.

1 eldono

Stephanie Jane recenzis Copy Boy de Shelley Blanton-Stroud

A compelling historical mystery

4 steloj

I'm really pleased to have been given this opportunity to read Copy Boy by Shelley Blanton-Stroud. I enjoy historical fiction, but, other than Steinbeck of course, I haven't read many stories set in Depression-era California. Copy Boy starts out with tense, violent scenes that vividly illustrated the poverty and desperation from which Jane must escape in order to 'do something' as her mother is confident she will. Momma is a wonderfully complex character - one of my favourites in this book. Mostly in spite of her wayward husband, she has managed to survive and raise her children in a series of jerry-built tents and slum shacks. Blanton-Stroud describes camps such as Tumbleweed in convincing detail. I was reminded more of Indian slums than of affluent America.

Jane herself didn't always capture my imagination as powerfully as the people around her which was a shame. However, her predicament of having to …

I'm really pleased to have been given this opportunity to read Copy Boy by Shelley Blanton-Stroud. I enjoy historical fiction, but, other than Steinbeck of course, I haven't read many stories set in Depression-era California. Copy Boy starts out with tense, violent scenes that vividly illustrated the poverty and desperation from which Jane must escape in order to 'do something' as her mother is confident she will. Momma is a wonderfully complex character - one of my favourites in this book. Mostly in spite of her wayward husband, she has managed to survive and raise her children in a series of jerry-built tents and slum shacks. Blanton-Stroud describes camps such as Tumbleweed in convincing detail. I was reminded more of Indian slums than of affluent America.

Jane herself didn't always capture my imagination as powerfully as the people around her which was a shame. However, her predicament of having to take on a male persona in order to get even the most basic employment, as a newspaper copy boy, obviously, allowed readers a good insight into this male dominated world through female eyes. Details such as Jane-as-Benny comparing her new boy treatment with the continuous abuse women staff endured was certainly eye-opening. Jane's journalistic ambitions drive the narrative in unexpected directions which kept me intrigued throughout the book. Copy Boy is a compelling historical mystery and I look forward to reading Blanton-Stroud's future work.

Temoj

Fiction, historical