FICTION

Fire Color One

by Jenny VALENTINE
240p. Philomel. Jan. 2017. Tr $17.99. ISBN 9780399546921.
COPY ISBN
Gr 8 Up—After pyromaniac Iris gets caught setting yet another fire, her mom, Hannah, and her stepfather whisk her from America to London, to live with Ernest, the father she's never met. Ernest is dying, and Hannah is desperate to get her hands on his fortune and priceless art collection. As Iris spends more time with Ernest, though, she begins to realize that he's not the man she's been taught to hate her whole life. They bond quickly over their shared love of art, in particular Fire Color One, a painting by Yves Klein that Iris learned about with her best friend, Thurston. Meanwhile, Thurston is somewhere on the other side of the world, and she has no way to reach him. A Carnegie Medal finalist, this beautifully written and darkly funny novel ends with a twist that will keep readers turning the pages long after bedtime.
VERDICT With family dysfunction at its center, this is a poignant story about the power of art to connect and transform from the author of Me, the Missing, and the Dead.
Reviewed by Sarah Polace, Cuyahoga Public Library System, OH , Dec 01, 2016

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