Thea Fenton’s life looks picture-perfect, but inside, she is falling apart. Wracked by anxiety no one seems to understand or care about, she resorts to self-harm to deflect the pain inside.
When a local teen commits suicide, Thea’s anxiety skyrockets. Unexplainable things happen, leaving her feeling trapped within her own chaotic mind. The lines between reality and another world start to blur, and her previously mundane issues seem more daunting and insurmountable than ever.
Then she meets Khi, a mysterious new boy from the coffee shop who seems to know her better than she knows herself—and doesn’t think she’s crazy. His quiet confidence and unfounded familiarity draw her into an unconventional friendship.
Khi journeys with her through grief, fear, and confusion to arrive at compassion for the one person Thea never thought she could love.
A deeply transformational novel from an authentic new voice in Christian young adult fiction.
As a teen, Tara K. Ross discovered how well-written prose can change the trajectory of a person's life. Case in point: her life. She now passes along this wisdom through her work as a school speech-language pathologist and mentor with local youth programs. She is also blessed with a ridiculously supportive family that grants her time to create stories that tackle the interplay of faith and mental health. FADE TO WHITE is her debut novel (IlluminateYA, May 2020).
When Tara is not writing or reading all things YA, you can find her rock climbing the Ontario escarpment, planning her family's next jungle trek or blogging at www.hopeprose.com.
INSTAGRAM | TWITTER | GOODREADS | FACEBOOK
MY REVIEW
This book was quite the wild ride! While it wasn't exactly what I was expecting after reading the synopsis, it was attention-grabbing from the start and it's easy to sympathize with the characters, especially Thea. Written in the first-person POV, it almost feels like you're stepping into Thea's shoes, especially with some of the problems she experiences through the story. It was a quick read for me - I read a bit more than the second half of it in one day. Thea deals with a lot of problems that are becoming more and more prevalent in today's society, especially among youth: mental health problems, stress, broken families, and just trying to find your place in the world. She struggles with anxiety while her family falls apart, and all of that stress is compounded by the shocking death of one of her classmates -- and she still refuses help, refuses to accept that she needs it. While we didn't see as much of the mysterious Khi as I would've liked, especially considering his role in the story, it was still very interesting to see how all of the pieces of the story wove together: Khi's convenient presence when Thea needed him most; her "fair-haired-child" brother's arrival back in town, the girl's suicide, and how it all ties the story up. It's almost like a contemporary YA meets just a taste of mystery and a good balance of faith (not overbearing, but a definite portion of the story), so it was a great read with excellent themes on growing past old grudges, overcoming peer pressure, healing, and accepting help when it's needed. Fade to White deals with all of these topics - and the ones I mentioned earlier - with grace and balances the bad side with the good rather well. It's difficult to find books that strike that balance among the scores of books that either romanticize suicide and anxiety and the ones that pretend neither exist in the world -- but this book is one of the good ones, and I'm glad it's out there for YA readers.
Pick up your copy HERE.
Do you plan on reading Fade to White?
No Comments Yet, Leave Yours!