Jacqueline Woodson

"A young girl uses crystal meth to escape the pain of losing her mother and grandmother in Hurricane Katrina, and then struggles to get over her addiction"--

An Elegy

Beneath a Meth Moon

Melissa Palmer

Book #83 Read in 2012
Beneath a Meth Moon by Jacqueline Woodson (YA)

This book tells the story of Laurel, a teenage girl, who is addicted to meth. Laurel's mother and grandmother are killed in a hurricane and that grief spirals Laurel into the grips of a drug addiction that means she risks losing her family, her friends and her life. This book shows what addiction does to people without going into vivid, gory detail.

Woodson is one of my favorite authors for young adult books. Her books are well written, have complex characters and deal with difficult issues. This book continues that pattern.

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Amanda Kordeliski

I was disapointed by this book because it jumps around so much. Laurel is struggling to make sense of the loss of her mother and grandmother in Hurricane Katrina and starting a new life years later in Iowa. She makes the cheerleading squad and starts dating the star basketball player who introduces her to "the moon"--meth. This book tries to follow Laurel's spiral into addiction while constantly jumping back to show glimpses of her past. The story jumps around from before Katrina, the two years in Jackson after Katrina, her life in Iowa before the moon, during and after. It was a struggle for me to follow all the flashbacks and disrupted the flow of the novel. The story itself is a sad one but I never really connected with Laurel and did not completely understand her out of control behavior. A short read to give to students wanting an Ellen Hopkins readalike but not as powerful as Hopkins.

Beneath a Meth Moon An Elegy

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