Thursday, September 11, 2014

Flicker - Melanie Hooyenga

I have promised myself that I will spend this month clearing out my dead-tree TBR pile. (It's a short pile, so it won't take long.)

First: I owe the author an apology. I won this book as part of a Goodreads giveaway quite some time ago, and have been putting off reading it in favor of books on my Kindle. And now I'm kind of sorry I did that, because I enjoyed it.

Flicker is about Biz, a teenage girl with an unusual talent: when she sees the right kind of flickering light, she time-travels about eighteen hours into her own past. This has pluses and minuses. Her grades are better because she can take the same test twice (and tell her friends exactly what to study for), and she can relive happy moments with her boyfriend. On the other hand, she also must endure lectures from her parents twice, as well as her father's bouts with a serious, mysterious illness. And her ability makes her feel like a freak -- so much so that she keeps it a secret from everyone.

And then she realizes she can use her talent to stop a criminal. The only catch is that she's going to have to trust someone with her secret.

The book is written in first person. Biz makes for a pleasant narrator -- not as manic as some teenage girls can be. If the reader can accept the time-travel aspects of the story, the plot is believable. And the story moves along at a nice clip -- so much so that I found myself staying up past my bedtime to finish the book.

Flicker is a YA novel. If I had to give it a rating, I'd say it's a PG. If you like YA fantasy, it's definitely worth a read.

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