Jane Arrowood never appreciates how normal her life is until suddenly ... it isn't. When the 15-year-old is attacked by a shark while swimming in the ocean, everything changes in an instant. Not only does she lose her right arm, but her plight becomes a very public one. While her hospital room fills with cards, flowers, and sob stories from complete strangers, Jane's boiling on the inside. She never asked to be anyone's role model. All she wants is to rewind her life. If she could only go back, she would avoid the water like the plague. Instead, she has to face high school, her friends, her future as a one-armed freak. Sometimes, she wishes the shark had just killed her right then and there.
As much as Jane has longed to leave the hospital, she's not quite prepared for the real world. Her mother coddles her, her older brother snaps at her, and her friends can never seem to say the right things. All the tasks Jane used to do with ease - drawing, cooking for her family, even tying a trash bag - are now hopelessly complicated. Add in fierce phantom pains, horrific nightmares, and the constant staring, and Jane's life pretty much sucks. Who would want to hang out with someone like her, let alone date her or hire her for a job? The shark, she comes to realize, didn't just take her arm, it took her whole life. Will she ever get it back?
Shark Girl, a debut YA novel by Kelly Bingham, is the affecting story of a girl's loss and her struggle to come to terms with it. Written in free verse, the novel's a quick read, but one that lingers in your mind long after you finish it. While the ending may be a little too tra-la-la, the rest of it seems real enough. Jane goes through all the stages of grief as a completely sympathetic character - the reader feels her suffering keenly. It's impossible not to empathize when we're given passages like this one:
Nurse: "You're so brave, Jane."
Hospital vounteer: "You are a hero."
Physical therapist: "You're a real survivor, know that?"

When people talk like that,
I could get up and slip away
and they'd still stand there,
talking to the cartoon cloud
they've drawn over my body.

Just once,
I'd like someone to say,
"Jane, you are a mess" (52).
Ultimately hopeful, Shark Girl reminds us of the natural resilience of human beings. It's a triumphant story that preaches tolerance, compassion and the futility of self-pity. You don't need to have your flesh shredded by a shark to relate to Jane's story. It just happens as you follow this terrified, tenacious girl who's forced into battle, not with a shark, but against life itself. You won't want to tote this novel along on your next beach trip. You will want to read it. And soon.

As much as her preacher husband has tried to wring it out of her, the superstitions of Abbe Deighton's South African childhood still seep out on occasion. Like now. With a bad moon rising over Honolulu, she's haunted by an unshakable sense of foreboding. If only she could summon a sangoma to chant the gloom away, she would feel much, much better. But African witch doctors are in short supply on Oahu and not even the most powerful magic can change what's going to happen under the unlucky moon. Cleo, the Deightons' 3-year-old daughter, is about to dodge in front of a car. She's about to pass from this life, leaving her parents heartbroken.

While Greg Deighton, a loyal pastor who "pretends he isn't perpetually disappointed with his flock, even though it doesn't afford him the same courtesy" (23) turns to God for solace, Abbe can't find peace anywhere. Her God can no longer be trusted, her friends don't understand, and her marriage is sinking under the weight of her pain. With nowhere to turn, Abbe dwells on her tumultuous past. The ancient curse on her family seems to be alive and well. Maybe putting it to rest will dull the aching in her heart, finally allowing some hope for the future. Or maybe the secrets of the past are better left buried in the shadows of the African night. Desperate for something to soothe her suffering, Abbe travels back to her ancestral home. As Abby's profound grief meets her shocking past, she must sort through the pain of it all to find the hope that abandoned her the day Cleo died. It's a journey both savage and soothing, alarming and affirming, troubling and triumphant, an epic trip into the ruins of her own heart. What she finds will astound her and change her life, once again.

Come Sunday, a heart-wrenching debut novel by Isla Morley, takes a penetrating look into the dark well of a mother's grief. Abbe's suffering is so palpable that a reader would have to be completely heartless not to feel for her. Her selfish moping makes her difficult to like at times, but no less sympathetic. Morley's prose is striking, making her characters and settings come to vivid life. It really is a stunning debut. However, although the book is ultimately hopeful, the overwhelming despair that looms over its pages makes Come Sunday a dark, disturbing read. It captured me with an enticing beginning and end, but lost me a little in the middle when I started to get tired of Abbe's endless moping. Heartless, I know. Overall, the book was well written, thought-provoking, and interesting. Did I love it? No. Will I keep an eye open for Morley's next venture? Absolutely.

While the book didn't enamor me as much as I wanted it to, it's receiving great critical acclaim. The winner of the Janet Heidinger Kafka Prize for 2009, Come Sunday was also longlisted for South Africa's prestigious Sunday Times Literary Award and became a finalist for the Commonwealth Writer's Prize. Like I said, it's a stunning first novel. Just not one with which I really connected.

(Readalikes: Hm, I don't know. Suggestions?)

Grade: B

If this were a movie, it would be rated: R for language and some sexual content

To the FTC, with love: I received a finished copy of Come Sunday from Isla Morley's publicist in exchange for an honest review. Thank you!