Read in eBook
3 April 2018, Kids Can Press
Goodreads Average Rating: 4.21
If there’s one thing Jett has learned over the past year, it’s that fresh starts aren’t all they’re cracked up to be. After a “rotten bad year” in a new town, at a new school, Jett returns to the coast to spend the summer with his Grandma Jo, hoping to forget.
But Jett carries a secret with him. As the summer unfolds, he finds himself examining memories of his past like bits of sea glass—arranging and rearranging them in an effort to make sense of his mistakes.
Told in free verse, this captivating story of betrayal and forgiveness will pull readers in . . . and not easily let them go.
- a recurrent or rhythmical pattern of coming and going or decline and regrowth
Of coming and going, or decline and regrowth, Jett is stuck in a crisis on where to stand; running along the currents of his life after a ‘rotten bad year.’ Ebb and Flow is a story of redemption — of coming after going, going after a decline, towards regrowth. It is about healing and forgiveness that does not only cater to young individuals but targets a larger audience, as well. Jett teaches us the power of acceptance; acceptance of the self. In a free-verse cosmos, Heather Smith takes us to the journey of becoming, from a rotten bad year toward sunshine.
The style of this oeuvre matches the rhythm of the story. The lack of direction, similar to Jett’s life: “One minute, you’re fine and the next, you’re the Hulk.” Where do we go from here? It depends. Everything depends on how we realize our true self. That’s Jett. Our dear Jett Plane. His rotten bad year teaches us a myriad lessons in life.
That a single spontaneous decision might become a destruction. Spontaneity comes in a package with luck, it may work or worse. There are decisions in life that involve contemplation, especially when it primarily entails annihilation. These are mostly the things that can’t be restored no matter how much you iron it — trust.
That there are always people most willing to help without expecting anything in exchange but your sanity. A presence of someone who understands you when you cannot simply understand yourself. Someone who drives you into finding yourself by yourself — healing.
That sometimes we need the pressure of a paperweight to push us into the limit, into digging deeper our soul. That sometimes, the people we imperil are the kindest of their kind. Alf and Smelly Nelly may be ‘insane’ but their minds are not tarnished with hatred against those who harm them; the purest minds breed the purest hearts — forgiveness.
Ebb and Flow is written to inculcate the sense that we are always in the process of becoming. We are an open book that anything can happen at a flip of a page, and all it takes is for us to take control in unveiling who we are, what we want to be, and how we want it to happen.
I am giving this five shining peonies. It may be short but it is filled with punches that pierce through our hearts. I will not explain it any further because I would like for you to read it and see for yourself. Walk the journey with Jett and you will come back stronger. I promise!
See you next blog, yeah?
I knew then that I had a heart because a terrible pain shot right through it.
Love, Lara Jean 