The Ruinous Sweep

Starred review from April 16, 2018
In Wynne-Jones’s tense, eerie thriller that lightly draws from Dante’s Inferno, 17-year-old Donovan Turner lies unconscious in a hospital after a hit-and-run left him gravely injured. His girlfriend, Beatrice “Bee” Northway, is at his side. While Donovan relives the events leading up to the accident in his mind (or, possibly, an otherworldly in-between place), Bee makes careful notes in her journal describing each sound that Donovan utters, hoping to piece together what may have happened. Then Donovan’s father is found beaten to death with Donovan’s baseball bat. After Bee’s boyfriend becomes a suspect in the murder, she puts herself in considerable danger to prove to the police that he’s innocent. Wynne-Jones cleverly employs elements of his trademark magical realism, and readers will enjoy making the connections between Bee’s discoveries and Donovan’s subconscious version of events; both versions are chilling. The courageous, clever Bee is a revelation, and her clear-eyed approach to finding the truth and her enduring love for Donovan, along with believably quirky characters and genuinely terrifying moments, will keep readers enthralled until the bittersweet finale. Ages 14–up. Agent: Barry Goldblatt, Barry Goldblatt Literary.

Starred review from June 1, 2018

Gr 8 Up-Donovan "Turn" Turner is in a coma after being critically injured in a hit-and-run. Bee, Turn's girlfriend, is by his side and determined to figure out what happened. After the police interview Bee, she learns that they aren't just looking for the runaway driver, but that Turn's father is dead and they suspect his son. Turn is caught in a world between life and death, but is able to give Bee some clues as to what transpired. The problem is the clues make it sound like Turn is indeed his father's killer. Bee knows he could never murder and decides to not share all her information with the police. Instead she puts the pieces of the puzzle together on her own. Taking inspiration from Dante's Inferno, Wynne-Jones presents an ambitious novel that is grim and suspenseful to the end. There are quick pivots in time-from the recent past to Bee's present to Turn's present and back again-as well as switches in narration between the two. Turn's experience in purgatory (or maybe the environs of hell?) is harrowing and confusing, adding to this page-turner that explores loyalty, guilt, anger, and redemption. VERDICT This murder mystery is highly recommended and would make for a great book-club read.-Emily Moore, Camden County Library System, NJ

Copyright 2018 School Library Journal, LLC Used with permission.

April 15, 2018
A teen boy with anger issues, critically injured in a car accident, is suspected of murdering his alcoholic father and staunchly defended by his high school girlfriend, Bee.The first part of Wynne-Jones' (Secret Agent Man Goes Shopping for Shoes, 2016, etc.) novel has a hallucinatory quality. Occasional chapters describe Bee's vigil by Donovan's bedside in the ICU, while the bulk of the text describes Dono's travels through a nightmarish world fraught with violence and danger. A series of bizarre encounters and escapes keeps readers off-balance, unsure what details, if any, are real. In this section, similarities to Dante's Inferno may or may not resonate with teen readers. A sharp break in the narrative occurs after a dramatic event and shifts the focus to Bee and the tone from horror-inflected to whodunit. Bee's detecting efforts bear fruit, but her foolhardy risk-taking is clearly plot-driven and may frustrate some readers. Wynne-Jones' writing is smooth and compelling, and certain images will likely linger in readers' minds. However, most characters are adults, which may distance some teens, and the motivation for the murder is both decidedly adult and not entirely convincing. Some aspects of the first section never quite connect to the rest, while the enigmatic author's note raises further questions. No racial diversity is apparent; class differences are implied.Suspenseful and complex, this will mesmerize readers patient enough to stick with it. (author's note) (Fiction. 14-18)

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May 15, 2018
Grades 8-11 Donovan is running for his life after causing a fatal accident. He keeps trying to contact his girlfriend, Beatrice, to tell her what happened, in hopes that she can help him get out of trouble. Meanwhile, Bee is doing just that, fighting to clear his name in the murder of his own father. In flashbacks?which depict a distorted sense of reality?readers slowly begin to discover who Donovan really is as a boyfriend, a son, and a person. Fans will learn of an earlier ultimatum given to Donovan by Bee, leading to his decision to break away from his father in a confrontation with disastrous results. Fans will love putting together the puzzle pieces to figure out what is really going on here on multiple levels. Some may find the ending bittersweet, but the heart of the latest from the acclaimed Wynne-Jones (The Emperor of Any Place, 2015) is refreshing. A literary thriller with riveting characters, infused with just a touch of magical realism.(Reprinted with permission of Booklist, copyright 2018, American Library Association.)

September 1, 2018
With Dante's allegorical journey to hell echoing throughout, this dark adventure tale begins with a teen, unsure of who he is or what has happened, being pushed out of a vehicle. All Donovan knows is that he must get to his high school girlfriend Bee, though he can't remember her?or even the previous night?with any accuracy. In the first half of the book, the narrative alternates between Donovan's harrowing twenty-four hours of trying to stay alive and Bee's attempts to try to unravel what had happened to Donovan, now unconscious in the hospital, and a suspect in his father's murder. Threads of magical realism weave into this first half as Donovan attempts to reconstruct events to understand from whom he is running and why; the second half shifts in tone and, seemingly, in genre, to mystery thriller. The two halves of the novel do not entirely seem to fit together, but the reader will be engrossed, like Bee, in unraveling the mystery and piecing together events as discovered by Donovan and Bee, who are both in increasing danger as they get closer to the truth. christina l. dobbs

(Copyright 2018 by The Horn Book, Incorporated, Boston. All rights reserved.)

January 1, 2019
In the first half of a book echoing Dante's allegorical journey to hell, a magical-realism-threaded narrative alternates between Donovan trying to stay alive and Bee's later attempts to unravel what happened to Donovan, now unconscious and a suspect in his father's murder. The second half shifts--in tone and seemingly in genre--to a thriller. Readers will be engrossed in unraveling the mystery and piecing together events.

(Copyright 2019 by The Horn Book, Incorporated, Boston. All rights reserved.)