DJ Jazzy Pho

Posted by Phoebe

I’m usually not to good at this internet networking stuff, but I got a GoodReads message from soon-to-be debuting author Kirsten Hubbard about a review I wrote awhile back and was so glad I did. And not just because I later ran into her on metafilter (gotta love those mefites). She just released the cover image for her first book, Like Mandarin, and it’s just as exciting as the blurb/premise:

I want to be beautiful like you, I thought, as if Mandarin were listening.

I want apricot skin and Pocahontas hair and eyes the color of tea. I want to be confident and detached and effortlessly sensual, and if promiscuity is part of the package, I will gladly follow your lead. All I know is I’m so tired of being inside my body.

I would give anything to be like Mandarin.

It’s hard to find beauty in the badlands of Washokey, Wyoming. Fourteen-year-old Grace Carpenter knows it’s not her mother’s pageant obsessions, or the cowboy dances and pickup trucks adored by her small-town classmates. True beauty is wild girl Mandarin Ramey: seventeen, shameless and utterly carefree.

Grace would give ANYTHING to be like Mandarin.

When the misfits are united for a project, they embark on an unlikely, explosive friendship, packed with nights spent skinny-dipping in the canal, liberating the town’s animal-head trophies, and constantly searching for someplace magic. Grace even plays along when Mandarin suggests they make a pact to run away together. Blame it on the crazy-making wildwinds that plague their badlands town.

But all too soon, Grace discovers Mandarin’s unique beauty hides a girl who’s troubled, broken and even dangerous. And no matter how hard Grace fights to keep the magic, even the best friendships can’t withstand betrayal.

I love books about complicated female friendships, and I don’t think there are nearly enough of them. So, in short, I’m jazzed about this book and this author. Keep an eye out for her, okay?

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Permalink | Comments (2) | Mar 3, 2010

2 Responses to “DJ Jazzy Pho”

  1. Kirsten Hubbard Says:
    March 4th, 2010 at 9:06 pm

    thanks so much, phoebe! complicated is the perfect word to describe this friendship.
    alas, if only my release weren’t a whole year away…

  2. Phoebe Says:
    March 4th, 2010 at 9:09 pm

    Of course, Kirsten! This post spurred a nice discussion on my facebook of people’s favorite complicated friendship books (Atwood was mentioned a bunch of times; Judy Blume is up there, too).

    I’m sure the release will be here before we know it!

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