Circa Now

by Amber McRee Turner

Overview

Twelve-year-old Circa Monroe has a knack for restoring old photographs. It's a skill she learned from her dad, who loves old pictures and putting fun digital twists on them. His altered "Shopt" photos look so real that they could fool nearly anybody, and Circa treasures the fun stories he makes up to explain each creation. One day, her father receives a strange phone call requesting an urgent delivery, and he heads out into a storm. The unimaginable happens: a tornado, then a terrible accident, and Circa never sees her dad again. Just as Circa and her mom begin to pick up the pieces, a mysterious boy shows up on their doorstep, a boy called Miles who remembers nothing about his past. The only thing he has with him is the photograph that Circa's dad intended to deliver on the day he died. As Circa tries to help Miles recover his identity, she begins to notice something strange about the photos she and her father retouched???the digital flourishes added to the old photos seem to exist in real life. The mysteries of the Shopt photos and Miles's past are intertwined, and in order to solve both, Circa will have to figure out what's real and what's an illusion. With stunning prose, captivating photographs, and a hint of magic, Circa Now is a gripping story full of hope and heart.

Product Details

ISBN-13:	9781423187837
Publisher:	Little, Brown Books for Young Readers
Publication date:	05/27/2014
Sold by:	Hachette Digital, Inc.
Format:	eBook
Lexile:	850L (what's this?)
File size:	12 MB
Note:	This product may take a few minutes to download.
Age Range:	8 - 12 Years

About the Author

AmberMcRee Turner lives and writes in Tennessee, where she and her family love to collect and tinker with vintage photographs. For more Shopt fun and to learn about Amber and her books, visit www.ambermcreeturner.com.

Editorial Reviews

04/01/2014
Gr 4–6—Teased at school, Circa is happiest in her family's photo studio, restoring photos on her father's computer. In one instant, it all changes when her dad is crushed to death by a tree during a tornado. Her father was the one who held together her mother during her bouts of deep depression; worked on a Memory Wall at the local home for dementia patients; and gave Circa a Shopt folder, a collection of silly photoshopped photos and accompanying stories. Soon after the fatal accident, the 12-year-old and her mother discover a teenage boy on their doorstep, covered with scars and holding the last picture her father worked on. He has no memory of any life before the storm, and they name him Miles. With a focus on finding out who this boy is and where he came from, her mother starts facing her anxiety and depression. Slowly, mother and daughter begin to heal with the addition of Miles in their lives. Though the premise of this book is unique, the chapters on Circa's life before the storm makes for a slow start. The inclusion of the photoshopped pictures throughout the text is clever and adds to the juxtaposition throughout the text of grief, sadness, and desperation, mixed with the laughter and happiness Circa feels about her new situation. Yet the characters seem distant instead of emotionally raw. An unusual story for a limited readership.—Clare A. Dombrowski, Amesbury Public Library, MA

School Library Journal

03/24/2014
Photography runs in 11-year-old Circa Monroe’s family: her mother shoots portraits for a living, and her father is an expert at photo restoration. As a fun aside, he also creates “Shopt” images, Photoshopping unusual additions into pictures he’s restoring, such as adding a baby, an oversize potato, and a bugle-playing beaver to an old photo of a family reunion. Circa is devastated when her father is killed in a deadly tornado strike, but a few weeks later, an amnesiac boy named Miles arrives on Circa’s doorstep with a copy of her father’s restored family reunion photo in his hand. Could Circa’s father’s Shopt images be magic, somehow able to make a Photoshopped baby become a real boy? Turner (Sway) offers a moving exploration of grief and an honest depiction of friends and family facing the hardest of times. Examples of Circa’s father’s altered images appear throughout the novel, with narrative captions that give the story a slight Miss Peregrine–meets–Harris Burdick atmosphere and add to its sense of mystery and possibility. Ages 8–12. Agent: Joanna Volpe, New Leaf Literary & Media. (June)

Publishers Weekly

"Just a tinge of fantasy pervades this captivating tale of grief and acceptance and of the power of imagination."—Kirkus Reviews

"the tenderness, imagination and hope underpinning the story, as well as the ultimate message of finding good in the bad, will have readers turning the pages to see how Circa might shape her present even if she can't change the past."—The Bulletin of the Center for Children's Books

"Turner's story is an intricate weave of grief and healing, friendship, trauma, and wishful desire; gentle quirkiness and light humor soften the dire issues [Circa Now] has an intelligent, compassionate originality that gleams throughout."—The Horn Book

"The inclusion of the photoshopped pictures throughout the text is clever and adds to the juxtaposition . . . of grief, sadness, and desperation, mixed with the laughter and happiness Circa feels about her new situation."—School Library Journal

"a moving exploration of grief and an honest depiction of friends and family facing the hardest of times. Examples of [Shopt photos] appear throughout the novel, with narrative captions that give the story a slight Miss Peregrine meets Harris Burdick atmosphere and add to its sense of mystery and possibility."—Publishers Weekly

PRAISE FOR SWAY

SWAY was selected a Starbucks/iBookstore Pick of the Week.

PRAISE FOR SWAY

"...by the end, Cass will have worked her quirky way into readers' hearts."—School Library Journal

PRAISE FOR SWAY

"This title, a first by the author and a recommended purchase, is filled with believable characters, inventive words, humor and sadness."—Children's Literature

PRAISE FOR SWAY

"Cass' strong, complex emotions resonate throughout the story, and the moments of tenderness ring true. A promising first novel."—Booklist Online

PRAISE FOR SWAY

"...fascinating and utterly credible...A linguistically playful heart-wrencher about healing, love, forgiveness and the power of believing in something good, whether it's old soap or your own family."—Kirkus Reviews

From the Publisher

2014-03-31
Circa, 11, and her father have nearly always engaged in a clever game they call Shopt. Since his job is restoring old photos using Photoshop, the game is a natural. He inserts unexpected objects into conventional images and then crafts funny stories to explain the bizarre photos—which, happily, are enticingly sprinkled throughout the novel. After he dies in a tragic accident, Circa's mother, who has been depressed for many years, has trouble coping—and Circa begins to encounter little clues that the Shopt images may contain a bit of magic. Do the pasted-in objects actually take on an existence of their own, and can that explain the sudden appearance at their doorstep of a young teen boy named Miles, who has no memory but a highly coincidental connection to her father's death? Or maybe Circa's just imagining the possibilities as she navigates the minefield of her own grief. She only gradually reveals her suspicions to Miles and her best friend, Nattie, who are just as tantalized as readers will be by the "fresh, sticky web of wonder" that accompanies the very chance of such magic. Sadly, it becomes clear that at least most of the coincidences can be explained by mundane reality, although there remains an alluring whiff of enchantment. Just a tinge of fantasy pervades this captivating tale of grief and acceptance and of the power of imagination. (Magical realism. 10-14)

Kirkus Reviews