Weightless: A Novel

by Sarah Bannan

Overview

When Carolyn Lessing moves from New Jersey to Alabama with her mother, she rattles the status quo of the juniors at Adams High. Gorgeous, stylish, a great student and gifted athlete without a mean girl bone in her body Carolyn is gobbled up right away by the school's cliques. She even begins dating a senior, Shane, whose on again/off again girlfriend Brooke becomes Carolyn's bitter romantic rival. When a make-out video of Carolyn and Shane makes the rounds, Carolyn goes from golden girl to slut in an instant, with Brooke and her best friend responsible for the campaign.
Carolyn is hounded and focused on, and becomes more and more private. Questions about her family and her habits torture her. But a violent confrontation with Shane and Brooke in the student parking lot is the last attack Carolyn can take.
A novel to drop us all back into the intensity of our high school years, WEIGHTLESS is a startling and assured debut.

Sarah Bannan's deft use of the first person plural gives Weightless an emotional intensity and remarkable power that will send you flying through the pages and leave you reeling.

Product Details

ISBN-13:	9781466851887
Publisher:	St. Martin's Publishing Group
Publication date:	06/30/2015
Sold by:	Macmillan
Format:	eBook
Pages:	336
Lexile:	1040L (what's this?)
File size:	1 MB

About the Author

Sarah Bannan grew up in New York, Texas, Florida and Alabama. She is the Head of Literature for the Irish Arts Council and lives in Dublin, Ireland, with her husband and daughter. Weightless is her first novel.
Sarah Bannan grew up in New York, Texas, Florida and Alabama. She is the Head of Literature for the Irish Arts Council and lives in Dublin, Ireland, with her husband and daughter. Weightless is her first novel.

Editorial Reviews

06/08/2015
In this finely crafted debut, Bannan skillfully delivers a tale of modern-day bullying. When beautiful, sophisticated Carolyn Lessing relocates with her mother to Adamsville, Ala., she's a rare newcomer to the cloistered small town. At first, she's accepted, even admired—until the pushed-aside popular high school girls turn vicious and engage in nightmarish torture of Carolyn via social media. The taunts grow progressively more cruel and even progress into physical violence—until Carolyn finally breaks, with actions that will reverberate for years to come. Told in the first-person plural (the narrators are never named), this chilling story has a haunting sense of immediacy. "We felt such shame it could be hard to sleep at night," they muse toward the end of the tale. Bannan's provocative novel will stay with readers long after they finish it, and should be an especially effective read for teens. (June)

Publishers Weekly

“Riveting, agile, and beautifully judged: one of those essential stories that will capture the imagination of different generations of readers. Superb.” —Colum McCann

“A provocative and timely novel.... Its subject matter is universal; parents and children around the world will recognise the difficult and fractured society it depicts.” —John Boyne, author of The Boy in the Striped Pajamas

“Weightless is...the work of a gifted storyteller with important things to say about the world we and our children inhabit. It is intelligent and nuanced but urgently relevant, and it's bravely and beautifully written.” —Joseph O'Connor, author of Star of the Sea

From the Publisher

05/01/2015
In the small town of Adamsville, AL, another school year is beginning and everyone knows what to expect. The same girls will be elected cheerleaders, the same teachers will inspire or irritate, and all hopes will be focused on the football team winning the state championship. That is until a new girl joins the junior class. Pretty, bright, and just a little mysterious, Carolyn Lessing disrupts the established order. Classmates who might never have turned into mean girls do, or did they? That's the question that troubles our narrator—a collective we, combining the voices of Lauren, Jessica, and Nicole, reluctant ladies-in-waiting to the popular set. In reliving the year, memories are probed, conflicting accounts are sifted, and all the insecurities and pressures of teen years lived under the constant scrutiny and instant judgements of social media are exposed. VERDICT Bannan's first novel takes a skillfully nuanced approach to the high school mean girls drama plot. No easy emotional pull of championing vindication for a victim here; expect instead to experience the unease of tangled intentions and perceptions that leave no clear answers while offering deep insights.—Jan Blodgett, Davidson Coll. Lib., NC

Library Journal

Andi Arndt’s skillful narration expresses the drama that follows in the wake of teenager Carolyn Lessing, whose arrival in Alabama from New Jersey shakes up the sleepy status quo at Adams High. Arndt superbly voices the reactions of Carolyn’s peers to this attractive outsider. With a soft Southern drawl, she sketches the cast of the school, including male and female students, teachers, parents, and coaches. But the weight of the narration—and Arndt’s most artful depiction—is carried by the “we” that voices most of the story. This innovative point of view captures the group of teenaged girls who witness—and, in a way, assist in—Carolyn’s tragic downfall. Provocative and fully engaging, this is a production that will haunt listeners. J.C.G. Winner of AudioFile Earphones Award © AudioFile 2015, Portland, Maine

NOVEMBER 2015 - AudioFile