Name: The Locket
ISBN: 9781595143358

Stacey Jay

Seventeen-year-old Katie uses a magical locket to change past mistakes, with disastrous results.

The Locket

Sarah Sammis

The Locket by Stacey Jay is a YA time travel story. Katie wants a way to fix things after her long time boyfriend breaks up with her on her birthday. He accuses her of cheating on him with a mutual friend. In her moment of despair, her Grandmother's locket begins to burn and hurdles her back in time, giving her a chance to change things.

Beware of wishes that are too easily granted. The locket is a cursed object (as the author discusses in her interview on The Hate-Mongering Tart blog). Every decision Katie makes in the past has consequences.

The time travel mechanics of The Locket are well thought out. The timelines work and there's enough drama and action to keep the pages turning.

Characterization, though, left me wanting more. Katie is too self obsessed. I get that she's a teenager but listening to her whine about how everything has to be perfect got old fast. Likewise, Isaac is too demanding, in a scary and potentially abusive way — making (at least to me) Katie's indiscretion at the start of the novel logical. Finally, Mitch, is a bit of a Marty Stu.

The Locket

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