Flutter

September 1, 2012
Billed as edgy science fiction, this novel's high-tech trappings conceal a genre romance with a hidden agenda. Emery's always had seizures that she experiences as time travel (she calls them "looping"). Increasingly disabling, they've weakened her body. Now she lives in the hospital, monitored by her widowed, neurologist father and his soulless scientist colleagues. While the looping experiences feel happy and serene, the transitions are killers. Emery's kinder, gentler future father warns her they'll get worse. A little boy she meets while time traveling urgently needs her help, and following his clues, Emery flees the hospital for a town in Michigan's Upper Peninsula. Arriving, she notes, "Lawns were clutter-free, the shrubs trimmed even in this cold season. And there were no paint-chipped houses, no screen doors with holes. This was a place that people took pride in. I liked it." Residents bearing European names exude rural worth. By now readers are aware they're not in edgy, sci-fi country anymore, Toto, but metaphorical Kansas, and--iPod notwithstanding--Emery is 17 going on 75. Once she meets handsome, tortured Asher, her transformation is complete. Linko, who's authored Christian children's fiction, writes smoothly. Her story holds readers' interest, but the ending's bait-and-switch strategy--following shifts in tone and sharp turns in plotting (untied strings dangling)--will leave them feeling manipulated. Science fiction in name only. (Paranormal romance. 12 & up)

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January 1, 2013

Gr 8 Up-Emery is a 17-year-old epileptic who claims to time travel while she is having seizures. No one believes her, of course, but then, suddenly, enough weirdness happens during an episode to get the attention of her father, who is a muckety-muck research doctor. While hospitalized, she runs away and meets Ash, a boy whom she sees in her visions but who turns out to be a real person, and she is suddenly caught up in a whirlwind adventure. What are her visions trying to tell her? Who is chasing her? Is all of this real or a product of her seizures? Flutter is an interesting read, and the characters are well-rounded. There is enough suspense to keep readers going through the slow spots, and though the story can shift abruptly due to the time jumps, the plot progresses nicely and combines suspense, family drama, science fiction, and romance. Though readers will most likely guess the ending, they will enjoy the ride.-Saleena L. Davidson, South Brunswick Public Library, Monmouth Junction, NJ

Copyright 2013 School Library Journal, LLC Used with permission.

November 15, 2012
Grades 7-12 Seventeen-year-old Emery Land is brilliant but physically damaged. She sleeps every night in a hospital where a team of doctors studies her condition, as she suffers from frequent seizures. Emery calls them loops because, to her, they're more like time traveling. She sees her scientist father as an old man, gently mellowed from his current distant self, and she sees a young boy with whom she clearly has a special, if undefined, connection. Desperate to find out what it all means, Emery runs away, taking a bus to the remote Michigan town that the boy told her about. There she finds a welcoming community and meets Ash, a handsome young drifter who is clearly trying to work through intense guilt with philanthropic acts. As her health spirals downwards, Emery begins to understand what's going on and what her visions really mean. Comfortably predictable romance is deepened here by genuine curiosity about an afterlife and a strong ethical sense of karma. There are few surprises and minimal characterization, but Linko takes the reader on a reflective journey that will inspire discussion.(Reprinted with permission of Booklist, copyright 2012, American Library Association.)

January 1, 2013
All her life, seventeen-year-old Emery has slipped into "loops," debilitating seizures that propel her through time and to strange locations. Frustrated with being studied in a hospital, Emery flees to Esperanza, a village from her loops, where she meets benevolent Ash, who seems mysteriously tied to the phenomena. This sometimes slow but intriguing novel will have readers grappling for explanations.

(Copyright 2013 by The Horn Book, Incorporated, Boston. All rights reserved.)