This One's for You

1
Caspian
Some mornings, when I m still drifting back and forth between asleep and awake, I think I can hear her voice. She s singing, or maybe she s laughing, and it s the color of sunlight on the back of my eyelids. Orange-gold. Glowing.
It s not her real voice. The human brain doesn t start making memories until the age of two, and she was gone long before that. She died in a time when there was nothing but a half-made, invisible foundation, when my subconscious was still being shaped by experiences that would never be remembered. She shaped me in the impression of her voice and her touch, and then her absence. But I ll never, ever know her.
If I let them, things with Mom can become an obsession. I m a detective and she is the case that will make my career. I m a scientist, and she is the grand, elegant equation that will explain the universe. But the rest of the time, she truly doesn t exist to me.
I run down the front steps and jump on my bicycle, the straps of my helmet dangling down around my ears. My American History final is in ten minutes; I just woke up and I haven t even brushed my teeth.
I begin pedaling furiously up the giant hill that leads away from the cul-de-sac. June gloom is in full force, so I m not sweating as hard as I could be by the time I get to the top. Just enough that I feel a trickle at the edge of my forehead.
I fly through the burned-out strip that is downtown El Sobrante, dodging a man who is riding his horse down the street. I pass Santa Shoe Repair, Nerd Crossing, Mountain Mike s Pizza. I barrel into the school parking lot and lock up my bike next to a monstrous hydrangea bush, run down the hallway, and slide into my seat at 8:59 a.m.
Hannah looks over at me and says, You look . . . interesting. Everything okay?
She s perfectly neat as always, and there is something deeply calming about her thick golden ponytail, her crisp white T-shirt, the tiny silver H at her throat. I reach up and tug the end of her

Kate Sweeney

*"A beautifully written story about grief, love, and not just discovering who you are but finding the courage to declare, This is who I am! before the world...This is a must-read for music fans and romantics who believe in destiny but know fate alone can t hold up a relationship even true love needs you to put in the work."--Booklist (starred review)

"Music fans will especially enjoy this story of two people learning to trust themselves and each other."--Kirkus Reviews

"Amplifying raw emotion through imagery-rich prose, Sweeney explores mental health and the transition to adulthood...[and] captures the sensory immersion of musical performance...via lyrical alternating perspectives."--Publishers Weekly


Praise for CATCH THE LIGHT:

"Beautifully captured, like a photograph of a stolen moment. I ached for Marigold in her journey to move forward while not forgetting her past. Kate Sweeney's Catch the Light overflows with grief, love, and growing up."--Amy Spalding, bestselling author of We Used to Be Friends

* Healing through art is a theme to which Sweeney, who is also a singer-songwriter, does beautiful justice. Her expressive prose renders quotable lines on nearly every page of Catch the Light as Marigold opens herself up to inhabiting the new life she's forging after and despite her great loss. Catch the Light is an affecting and affirming case for the painful, transformative inevitability of hope in the face of heartache. --BookPage (starred review)
 
"An edgy love story in which everyone seems to have a secret to hide."--Kirkus Reviews
 
"Sweeney writes with fluid elegance, effectively capturing the foggy disengagement often conferred by mourning...[while the romance] offers plenty of sweetness despite the shadows"--BCCB

"A captivating study of the ways grief affects families, friendships, and the very idea of love."--Booklist