How do you know? How do you know when this is the one?
Owen and Lucy are about to spend some hot and unsettling hours stuck in an elevator in their apartment building in New York Citys. When they are finally rescued, they discover the East Coast power grid is down and their normally fast-paced, neon light blinking, anonymous city has shed its camoflage and is now dark, slower and reduced to small communities of sweating people in search of batteries, flashlights, ice and connection with other human beings.
Lucy's apartment is up about seventeen flights of stairs where she lives with her well-heeled, travel loving parents and up to now, her two older brothers who have grown up to college and lives of their own. Owen's apartment is in the basement where he lives with his father, the apartment "engineer," who has landed this job and living space out of the sympathetic heart of a relative. Owen's mother has recently been killed in an accident and both father and son are still grieving her loss and the loss of their life as a family.
So, two teens, pretty much on their own, cross paths in a blackout. When the lights come back on and the city comes back to life, their lives cross paths a few more times and those pin prick feelings that come with a certain electricity start making themselves known. Time spent together is sparse but does the necessary work of deepening the connection and the feelings between them. Not that they are that much aware of all of this but we sense it as we watch them go about their separate lives.
Then fate intervenes and Owen's father loses his job and they hits the road headed to California. Lucy's father gets a job offer in Edinburgh and she's suddenly flying across the ocean to adjust to life on an entirely new continent.
The farther they fly from each other the deeper we know they care. How will they find each other again? Will they find each other again? If they do find each other again, will they know how right they are for each other? Are they really that good of a match?
Sometimes you just need to see each other one more time to know for sure.
This is a sensational summer read, perfect for the winter holidays or just any time you need to pick up a book that will have a satisfying story, a building romance and characters you would like to befriend. Utterly sighworthy.
Ages 12 and up (no sex) 337 pages 978-0316254779
Recommended by: Barb, abookandahug.com
Read alike: STATISTICAL PROBABILITY OF LOVE AT FIRST SIGHT
