The Notorious Pagan Jones

Gr 9 Up—Intertwined with historical events surrounding the formation of the Berlin Wall in 1961, this novel traces the recovery of former film sweetheart Pagan Jones. After Pagan drunkenly kills her family in a car accident, she is sentenced to juvenile detention—a rather light sentence compared to the tortuous guilt weighing on her. When the opportunity to star in a Berlin-based film presents itself, Pagan takes the chance and gets out of juvie borne on the arm of her court-appointed guardian, Devin Black. What the teen starlet slowly realizes is that her part in this film is merely superficial; her real objective is to help Devin infiltrate the East German government—the role of a lifetime. Danger, dancing, and daring capers fill the pages of Pagan's adventure and her climb back to stardom. Fans of Elizabeth Wein's Code Name Verity (Disney-Hyperion, 2012) and Ruta Sepetys's Between Shades of Gray (Philomel, 2011) will not be disappointed with the author's latest.