Lock and Key

Sarah Dessen

- 4.2 • 25 Ratings

- £4.99

- £4.99

Ruby Cooper likes to expect the worst. That way, she's never disappointed.

Abandoned by her mother and forced to leave the house she calls home, Ruby is facing too many changes. Her lonely world has been transformed into a life of luxury by her long lost sister, but all Ruby wants to do is leave - she can make it on her own. Even Nate, the gorgeous boy-next-door can't seem to change her mind. Will Ruby realize first impressions don't always count? And that sometimes, people can surprise you, so it's ok to let the closest ones in . . .

PUBLISHERS WEEKLY 18 FEB 2008

Dessen (Just Listen; see Profile) inverts a familiar fairy tale: What if Cinderella got the prince, the castle and all its accoutrements, but wasn't remotely interested? After her mother abandons her, Ruby Cooper is flying below the radar of officialdom and trying to make it to her 18th birthday, when she's busted by the landlord and turned over to social services. Ruby is taken in by her estranged sister, Cora, who left for college a decade earlier and never looked back, and Cora's husband, Jamie, the wealthy founder of a popular social networking site. Resentful, suspicious and vulnerable, Ruby resists mightily, refusing the risky business of depending on anybody but herself, and wearing the key to her old house around her neck. All the Dessen trademarks are here the swoon-worthy boy next door who is not what he appears to be, and the supporting characters who force Ruby to rethink her cynical worldview, among them the frazzled owner of a jewelry kiosk at the mall. The author again defines characters primarily through dialogue, and although Ruby and her love interest, Nate, sound wiser than their years, they talk the way teens might want to from the heart. A must for Dessen fans, this will win her new readers, too. Ages 12-up.

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