Book Review | See All the Stars by Kit Frick

Title: SEE ALL THE STARS

Author: KIT FRICK

Published: 14TH AUGUST 2018 BY MARGARET K. MCELDERRY BOOKS

Genre: YA LITERATURE FICTION

We Were Liars meets Goodbye Days in this thrilling debut novel that sweeps readers away as they try to solve the mystery of what happened then to make Ellory so broken now.

It’s hard to find the truth beneath the lies you tell yourself.
Then: They were four—Bex, Jenni, Ellory, Ret. (Venus. Earth. Moon. Sun.) Electric, headstrong young women; Ellory’s whole solar system.
Now: Ellory is alone, her once inseparable group of friends torn apart by secrets, deception, and a shocking incident that changed their lives forever.
Then: Lazy summer days. A party. A beautiful boy. Ellory met Matthias and fell into the beginning of a spectacular, bright love.
Now: Ellory returns to Pine Brook to navigate senior year after a two-month suspension and summer away—no boyfriend, no friends. No going back. Tormented by some and sought out by others, troubled by a mysterious note-writer who won’t let Ellory forget, and consumed by guilt over her not entirely innocent role in everything and everyone she’s lost, Ellory finds that even in the present, the past is everywhere.
The path forward isn’t a straight line. And moving on will mean sorting the truth from the lies—the lies Ellory has been telling herself.

I thought this was a beautifully written book. I sometimes find literary fiction a bit difficult to get into, which was the case at the beginning of this story. Once it started to pick up, though, I was pretty engrossed. This was told by way of two timelines – then and now. I wasn’t a massive fan of that set up, however, we wouldn’t have been able to watch Ellory work through the most difficult experience of her life.

By virtue of alternating timeline, we are aware of some massive event that occurs between Ellory and her friend, Ret, and we get inside Ellory’s head since the chapters are her POV. The chapters set in the then timeline are compulsive page-turners. I just couldn’t stop reading those. The ones set in the now timeline, didn’t keep my attention quite so well until near the end. I just wanted to get through them to find out what happened.

I did really enjoy this story because it shows teens working through the difficult concepts of grief and betrayal. And the ending completely surprised me. I think my final words were ‘oh my gosh.’ I gave it FOUR STARS. It’s well worth a read.

Will you be reading it?