We Made It All Up
-
- $9.99
-
- $9.99
Publisher Description
A contemporary, high-stakes thriller about how reality becomes more twisted than the fantasy novel two friends are writing when the real-life subject of their fiction turns up dead and they’re the suspects, for fans of Mare of Easttown and One of Us Is Lying.
Celeste is the talk of the town when she moves to Montana from Montreal, but the only friend she makes is Vivvy, the heir to the town’s founder and a social pariah. Inspired by a passion-fueled school incident, they begin writing a love-story fanfic between the popular guy and the school stoner, one that gradually reveals Celeste’s past. While her bond with Vivvy makes Celeste feel safe and alive again, Vivvy keeps prodding Celeste to turn fantasy into reality. When they finally try, one drunken night on a dark mountainside, Celeste is the one who ends up kissing golden boy Joss. And Joss ends up dead.
Celeste doesn’t remember the end of that night and can’t be sure she didn’t deliver the killing blow. Could she still be that scared of getting close to a boy? Secrets are hard to keep in a small town, and even Vivvy seems to suspect her. Exploring the winding passages of the cave where Joss died, Celeste learns he had his own dark secrets, as does Vivvy. The town isn’t as innocent as it appears.
PUBLISHERS WEEKLY
Harrison (The Glare) artfully weaves subtle fantasy with contemporary psychological terror in a disconcerting thriller. High school junior Celeste Bergstein, who is Jewish, has moved with her divorced father from Montreal to Defile, Mont. She's happy to be out of Montreal and far away from her drama workshop director, who stalked and abused her. Celeste eventually meets and befriends eccentric teen and town pariah Vivienne Kray, and the two spend their days writing fantastical love stories starring their combative classmates, hockey star Joss Thorsenn and local weed dealer Seth Larkin. Alternating between the present and two and a half months prior, the narrative culminates in a night of Celeste, Joss, Seth, and Vivvy drinking and playing spin the bottle at Kray Cave, a secluded hangout spot in the woods. At school the next day, they discover that Joss is dead, and Celeste, who cannot recall anything beyond kissing him, worries that she is somehow responsible for his death. Harrison thoughtfully explores themes of self-harm, psychological manipulation, and sexual violence using atmospheric writing, convincing dialogue, and a clever narrative structure in this eerie tale. Characters cue as white. Ages 14–up.
