Dating Down

by Stefanie Lyons

Overview

At Café Hex, Samantha Henderson can imagine being the person she really wants to be. It’s her place to daydream about going to art school and getting away from her politician father. It’s her place to imagine opening herself up to a new kind of connection, away from her family and the drama of high school. Enter X—the boy she refuses to name. He’s older, edgy, bohemian . . . in short, everything she thinks she needs. Her family and friends try to warn her that there may be more to him than she sees, but still she stays with X, even as his chaos threatens to consume them both. Told in waves of poetry—whispering, crashing—Dating Down is a portrait of exhilaration and pain and the kind of desire that drives a girl to risk everything.

Product Details

ISBN-13:	9780738743370
Publisher:	North Star Editions
Publication date:	04/08/2015
Pages:	312
Product dimensions:	5.10(w) x 7.90(h) x 0.80(d)
Age Range:	14 - 18 Years

About the Author

Stefanie Lyons (Chicago, IL) holds an MFA from Vermont College of Fine Arts. She has published poems and short stories in Sounding Review, Burningwood Literary, and Bartleby Snopes.|

Stefanie Lyons (Chicago, IL) holds an MFA from Vermont College of Fine Arts. She has published poems and short stories in Sounding Review, Burningwood Literary, and Bartleby Snopes. 

Editorial Reviews

"Told in musical, poignant verse, Sam's story is lyrical and heartwrenching." —Booklist

"A fast, freefalling read that's difficult to put down." —Jessica Machado, associate editor of Rolling Stone

"Gritty, lyrical, often heart-stopping verse . . . a breathless stay-up-all-night read." —Stasia Ward Kehoe, author of The Sound of Letting Go and Audition

"Stefanie Lyons perfectly captures the sizzle and pop poetry of an electric first love." —Kirsten Smith, author of Trinkets and screenwriter for Clueless and 10 Things I Hate About You

From the Publisher

07/01/2015
Gr 9 Up—Contemporary fiction set in a small town near Chicago, IL. Written in prose, and reminiscent of Ellen Hopkins's popular book Crank (S. & S., 2013), this story chronicles Samantha's relationship with a boy she refers to only as "X." As Samantha and X's relationship progresses, the angst escalates in her relationships with friends and family. When her friends warn her that she is dating someone whose morals and values do not match her own, Samantha chooses to ignore these words of wisdom because of her initial infatuation with X. Ironically, what each of her best friends fails to see is that they, too, are "dating down." This theme is rampant throughout the book and will speak to a wide variety of teens who have either dated a similar type of person or know someone who has. The pacing is a bit choppy at first, but as the story advances, the book becomes more fluid. The characters are well developed and rather typical of many love-struck teens today. The mood reflects the actions of the main character, Samantha. It's light and playful when she first develops feelings for a new boy, then it gradually evolves into something a bit darker when she finds out he is into drugs, and it becomes darker still when she decides to join him by taking drugs herself. Samantha finally evaluates her life and decisions and struggles to turn her life around. VERDICT The prose format and dramatic plotline make this ideal for reluctant teen readers.—Jeni Tahaney, Duncanville High School Library, TX

School Library Journal

2015-01-20
A teen falls into a damaging romance."I will call him X," says Sam about her narrative choice not to name this story's boy, "for the number of times I plunged into self-destruction." She meets X at the coffeehouse where he works. He's lanky, and he's also 22 to her 17; he "wants to ride his Vespa / through the coffee fields of Columbia." Sam's a painter and projects an undeserved bohemian-artist image onto X. When he mentions desiring a media empire like Hugh Hefner's—not the naked girls, he adds, just the empire—Sam doesn't bat an eye. X's heady allure pulls her headlong out of her world of SAT prep, presided over by a pearl-wearing stepmother and a father who cares only about his reputation as an aspiring politician. The real X lies and cheats. He's a drug user and a dealer; the Vespas he drives are stolen. Sam does drugs with him, steals her stepmother's diamond earrings and gives them to a random fellow partier. "Is this what love is? / A jerky jagged jumpy ride?" The nonuniformity of Lyons' prose poems, which continually shift form and style, employing choppiness, odd spacing and fast beats ("Meet a guy / butterflies // then come lies / systemized"), among other devices, matches Sam's lack of grounding. Give this to Ellen Hopkins fans. Turbulent love via turbulent poems. (Verse fiction. 14-18)

Kirkus Review