Kirkus Reviews Best Young Adult Books 2007: An Excerpt

http://www.kirkusreviews.com/kirkusreviews/images/pdf/Best_Young_Adult.pdf

Undercover
Beth Kephart
Laura Geringer/HarperCollins
September / 9780061238932 / $16.99

A successful memoir author, National Book Award nominee Beth Kephart turned to young-adult novels after a conversation with Laura Geringer. “On the train ride back from my meeting with Laura, the voice of a character rose up in me. I wrote the first ten pages within that 45-minute ride. I couldn’t stop myself after that,” says Kephart. Teaching teen-writing workshops and reading 160 books as chair for the 2001 young people’s literature jury for the National Book Awards also birthed her YA voice. Undercover is the story of Elisa, a high-school girl outside the “in crowd.” Elisa loves words and is the “Cyrano de Bergerac” behind several of the school’s popular couples, including Theo, who touches Elisa’s heart. Although he encourages her to pursue her love of ice-skating, he keeps his distance—and the girlfriend he captured with Elisa’s words—until Elisa captures his heart. Elisa’s love of words is similar to the author’s. “I love the shape and sound of words,” says Kephart. “A single word, well-considered, can launch a story or a poem.” Like Elisa, Kephart keeps a Book of Words, started in her 20s, which she still keeps today. In writing for young adults, Kephart feels she has tapped into something deep. “When I sat down to write my first YA novel, something very essential happened to my idea of pacing. A different kind of energy got injected into my narrator’s voice,” she says. “I have never had so much outright fun writing…and it’s because I am enjoying myself so much with this that I have written so furiously, so fast.” Empowering and using the beauty of language and movement to connect with readers, Undercover is the first of four novels scheduled.