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Out of the Easy
CCBC Review:
Josie has lived in the French Quarter of New Orleans since she was seven and her mother returned to the city to work for Willie Woodley, a madam running a house of prostitution. Now seventeen, Josie dreams of heading off to college in the north. If her mother has been extraordinarily selfish and unreliable through the years, Josie is fortunate that other adults have not, from Willie--who has been a steadfast if prickly source of love and support--to Willie’s assistant Cokie to local bookseller and writer Charles Marlowe. Josie has lived above his shop since she was twelve. Now that Charles has dementia, Josie and his son Patrick are keeping the store going. Josie’s mother, self-absorbed and shallow (“Don’t hate her, pity her,” Charles once told young Josie), announces she’s heading to Hollywood with her criminal boyfriend, Cincinnati, just after Josie learns the kind tourist who stopped by the shop the day before has been found dead at a local nightclub. The man made Josie feel like she could achieve her dreams. Josie’s other job is cleaning each morning at Willie’s, and in her mother’s room she finds a watch inscribed to the dead man. As she tries to map her own future, she is caught up in the man’s death, in applying to Smith at the urging of a young woman who visited the store, in helping Patrick preserve his father’s dignity, and--for the first time in her life—in keeping secrets from Willie. She also must decide what she is willing to compromise in pursuit of her dreams. Ruta Sepetys’s novel set in 1950 New Orleans not only captures that time and place with literary distinction, but is populated with wonderfully realized characters in a story that is at once gritty and full of hope. ©2013 Cooperative Children’s Book Center
CCBC Age Recommendation: Age 14 and older
Age Range:
Grades 9-12 (Age 14 and older)
Format:
Novel
Subjects:
20th Century
City Life
College
Crime
Historical Fiction
Mothers
Mysteries
Older Adults
Secrets
Violence
Publisher:
Philomel
Publish Year: 2013
Pages: 346
ISBN: 9780399256929
CCBC Location: Fiction, Sepetys