Crushing

Leave it to Rory to get stuck in a storm drain trying to rescue a puppy!  Out of nowhere her former neighbor and bad boy Gage pulls her out. He has rescued her again -just like he always did when they were kids. She still has nightmares from when she was a kid - teenage girls were disappearing from the area and she herself was almost grabbed by a strange man.  Back then too, Gage got her out just in time. 

Now that Gage is back, Rory's childhood crush returns with a vengeance.  Of course, this doesn't impress her parents or her best friend Dominic, who wants to be so much more.  When her friend Lindsay disappears the whole town falls into a panic. Did Lindsay’s disappearance have anything to do with the teenage girls who had disappeared from the area so many years ago?

Elena Dillon beautifully and realistically describes a teenage girl’s life! She deftly fills out the characters' personalities making them rich and real without going too far and slipping over the line to boredom.  Rory’s growing relationship with her childhood friend, Gage is filled with attraction and trepidation. The secret code words that Rory and her girlfriends use are perfectly typical of teenage girls! The reader is also given a glimpse of Rory’s family life, her loving and playful relationship with her overprotective brothers, even the interaction on the golf course with the golf team. All of this detail is given while vividly describing how it feels to be so frightened of something unknown and terrifying. Well done, Ms. Dillon!

Rose Mary Espinoza