Publishers Weekly
This exquisite novel in verse tells the story of 16-year-old Angel, who has been working as a prostitute in Vancouver for nine months after her father throws her out. After Angel’s friend Serena disappears, Angel decides to give up her pimp Call’s “candy” (the drugs he feeds her) and try to return home. Angel’s withdrawal is severe (“I threw up in Call’s bathroom sink/ so hard I thought bits of stomach/ slid out of my mouth”) but it’s nothing compared to the pain she feels when Call brings home an 11-year-old girl, Melli, to follow in Angel’s footsteps. Angel is determined to keep Melli safe, even while other women continue to disappear. National Book Award finalist Leavitt (Keturah and Lord Death) makes good use of Milton’s Paradise Lost, which a john has Angel read aloud to him “while he does his thing,” but the triumph of this story is in Angel’s painfully real voice. Her matter-of-fact descriptions of her time with the johns are searing, and the casual brutality of her life will haunt readers. Ages 14–up. Agent: Brenda Bowen, Sanford J. Greenburger Associates. (Sept.)¦
From the Publisher
* Angel's story is a stunning, haunting portrait of exploitation and redemption.” Horn Book Magazine, starred review
“* This is a powerful book that will leave readers wishing they could hear more of Angel's gripping story.” School Library Journal, starred review
“* Angel's story is uniquely her own, and Leavitt has done a brilliant job of imagining and recording it.” Booklist, starred review
“* Exquisite.” Publishers Weekly, starred review
“* An astonishing, wrenching achievement.” Kirkus Reviews, starred review
“Powerful moments of brutality exist alongside equally powerful moments of insight in this exceptionally moving portrayal of life on the street.” BCCB
“Astonishing! Dark matter shot through with light. This is Leavitt at her brilliant best.” Tim Wynne-Jones, author of Blink & Caution, a Boston Globe–Horn Book Award winner
“My Book of Life by Angel is exquisitea story that sees into and under and above all manner of things. Martine Leavitt's angry-making, beautiful, and profoundly compassionate story is a wonder that embraces both human and divine. What a glorious book!” Caroyln Coman, author of Many Stones, a Printz Honor Award and National Book Award finalist book
“The title is perfect, the voice authentic, the depth of research must have been excruciating. Once we begin this compelling, essential story, we find we must read to the end. The compassion and sensitivity of the telling make it possible to do so.” Helen Frost, Printz Honor award–winning author of Hidden
“Martine Leavitt creates a tight, desperate space where Billy Budd and Lucifer co-mingle. Unblinkingly grim. Masterfully ethereal.” Rita Williams-Garcia, author of One Crazy Summer, a National Book Award finalist book and a Newbery Honor book
“Without a doubt this book will go a long way in building awareness in all those who read it.” Wayne Leng, creator of missingpeople.net
Kirkus Reviews
The tragedy of discarded children is skillfully explored in this stunning novel in verse. Angel, 16, pretends she lives at the mall, helping herself to shoes on display. She falls prey to a pimp named Call, who watches her shoplift, buys her meals and gives her "candy" (crack). Knowing that "it's the ones from good homes / who follow orders best," Call persuades Angel to do him a favor with chilling ease. Turning tricks on a street corner in Vancouver, she meets Serena, who teaches her to fend for herself with "dates" and encourages her to write her life. When Serena goes missing, Angel vows to clean up her act. Dope sick, she slowly wakes up to Call's evil, weathering the torments of her captive life with courage. The deliberate use of spacing emphasizes the grim choice confronting Angel when Call brings home a new girl, 11-year-old Melli. Leavitt's mastery of form builds on the subtle interplay between plot and theme. "John the john" is a divorced professor who makes Angel read Book 9 from Milton's Paradise Lost, inadvertently teaching her the power that words, expression and creativity have to effect change. Passages from Milton frame the chapters, as Angel, in her own writing, grasps her future. Based on the factual disappearance of dozens of Vancouver women, this novel of innocence compromised is bleak, but not without hope or humor. An astonishing, wrenching achievement. (author's note) (Fiction. 14 & up)