The Secret Year
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4.4 • 20 Ratings
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- $7.99
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- $7.99
Publisher Description
Colt and Julia were secretly together for a year, and no one ever knew, not even Julia's boyfriend. Why would they-they were from two different crowds. Julia lived in her country club world and Colt . . . didn't. Then Julia dies in a car accident. Colt is devastated but can't mourn openly, and he's tormented that he may have played a part in her death. And when Julia's journal ends up in his hands, he is forced to relive their year together-just when he is trying to forget. The problem is, how do you get over someone who was never really yours to begin with?
PUBLISHERS WEEKLY
Julia is from the rich crowd on Black Mountain while Colt lives "in a house with father's junked cars all over the yard." For a year they meet secretly for sex and intense conversation by the river between them, until Julia is killed in a car crash. Colt navigates his grief privately until Julia's brother, Michael, gives him Julia's journal. Debut author Hubbard effectively intermingles Colt's memories, Julia's secret letters to Colt, and the present, as Colt falls into a relationship with a friend, deals with the aftermath of his brother's coming out, and falls in love again. The journal, as well as hints of the fight Colt and Julia had their last night together, create hooks that draw in the reader, but it's the smooth pacing and well-drawn characters that elevate the book. The community's class animosity is realistic and stark but, as in life, is never fully resolved. When Michael gives Julia's poems about Colt to the student literary journal, Colt and Julia's secret is finally revealed. It's a moving portrait of grief and the sharp societal lines that divide. Ages 12 up.
Customer Reviews
So sad :(
I loved this book it's just so sad idk how I would go through what Colten did. Good book tho