Today, let’s revisit two of our Pyrite 11 that both have at their cores events that forever change their protagonists. I am, of course, talking about Jandy Nelson’s I’ll Give You the Sun and Andrew Smith’s 100 Sideways Miles.
I’ll Give You the Sun, Jandy Nelson
Dial Books for Young Readers, September 2014
Reviewed from digital galley and final copy
A lot of things make me cry. A great book, a sad movie, and occasionally, a really moving commercial*. I have a long list and I’m really honest about being particularly susceptible. But I’m also really honest when I know I’m being manipulated in a cheap or shallow way.
The last lines of I’ll Give You the Sun made me ugly cry and it was glorious catharsis. No tricks or unearned tears here. I won’t spoil the direct quote because you really should experience it in context, but I will say that in those sentences Jandy Nelson pulls all of the book’s themes together; those last words contain the entire novel.
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