First Lines Fridays: February 17th, 2017
It’s First Lines Friday, and I’m back with a quote from a new book by one of my favorite authors. Ready?
About:
Each week we will pick a YA or NA book from our shelves and copy the first line, in an attempt to acquaint you with some new reads or reintroduce you to old favorites. We will have an accompanying Instagram pic to go along with our choices each week so check out #firstlinesfridays!
First Lines Fridays is a weekly feature for book lovers hosted by Wandering Words. What if instead of judging a book by its cover, its author or its prestige, we judged it by its opening lines? If you want to join the meme be sure to check out Wandering Words, and here are her rules below.
The rules:
- Pick a book off your shelf (or your current read) and open to the first page.
- Copy the first few lines, but don’t give anything else about the book away just yet – you need to hook the reader first.
- Finally…reveal the book!
Here are the first lines:
“Talon Alvarado, party of one.
The sunset was her cue to get the celebration started. She told herself she’d wait until dark but even that was a stupid deadline. She’d been waiting for her mother her whole damn life.”
The book is called Chalk Houses, and it’s from Tracy Clark, who never ceases to amaze me. You may be familiar with my love for Tracy’s paranormal Light Key Trilogy; Chalk Houses is a YA contemporary about a teenager named Talon and her complicated relationships with everyone in her world. Tracy writes complex teenagers like nobody’s business, and she never fails to make me do two things: one, shake my head in awe at the realness (i.e. stupidity, vulnerability, intelligence, and hilarity) of her characters, and two, cry. If you haven’t read any of her books, you’re truly missing out.
Chalk Houses by Tracy Clark
Category: Young Adult, Contemporary
Publication: January 17th. 2017
Purchase: Amazon
Everyone has a secret. Now Secret is talking.
Talon Alvarado has one goal – to be nothing like her mother who’s blown it in about every way. But sometimes you focus so hard on what you don’t want that you find yourself careening toward it. Bombarded with history, hurts, and secrets, Talon is struggling to be the person she yearns to be and to live a bigger life than girls like her are supposed to wish for. To climb out, she must dig for strength in the most unlikely place; the rubble of her bruised heart.
The misty presence of Secret reveals its role in Talon’s life, showing how the secrets we keep tell our stories.
Chalk Houses is a gritty, achingly hopeful story about love being in the places you forgot to look, and about starting over. Even at the end.
