Almost seventeen-year-old-wanna-be-screenwriter Quinn Roberts has become very anti-social–“..which is what happens when your big sister gets killed in a car wreck, right outside the school on the day before Christmas break.” So, yeah. Now it’s summer, and things have just gotten worse. Quinn and his mom are subsisting on a steady diet of sorrow and Healthy Choice frozen dinners. Finally driven out of his house by a broken air conditioner and his concerned friend Geoff, Quinn shrugs off his grief long enough to take a shower and attend a college party where he meets a sexy older college guy named Amir who makes his heart go pitter pat. Did I mention Quinn is gay? He is, even though “I’m still not out. It just seems like a hassle to come out. I want to just be out.” Amir is a great distraction to what’s really going on with Quinn, which is a) once again, his sister and best friend Annabeth died b) the last text he sent to Annabeth was something he wishes he never had to think about again c) he is terrified to complete his application to a prestigious film program without her sarcastic but loving support. Without Annabeth’s direction, will the screenplay of Quinn’s life just die in development? This raucous dark comedy is full of author Tim Federle‘s trademark witticisms–I couldn’t stop chuckling and underlining such gems as these while I read:
“I became enamored of the idea of having my own little pool. I was going to make it in the shape of a Q, and the slash at the bottom of the Q was going to be the hot tub.”
“If you don’t know what hangover feels like, congrats. You’re smarter than I am. It’s like a sledgehammer eloped with a swing set and they honeymooned in your head.”
Sometimes Quinn’s voice is a little too frenetic as the wisecracks just keep coming hard and fast page after page with no rest in between. But what the reader quickly realizes is that Quinn has to keep quipping in order to maintain his sanity. Because once he really looks at what has happened to family and asks himself some hard questions about his part in it, there’s no going back. And there’s nothing really funny about that. While you sadly have to wait until March 2016 to experience the witty stylings of Federle’s YA debut, there’s no time like the present to check out his equally diverting Better Nate Than Ever