NOTHING TO LOSE

Michael Daye has been living under an assumed name and traveling with a carnival for the past year, but he returns with the carnival to Miami just as his mother is about to stand trial for murdering her abusive older husband, supposedly right after Michael left. Sickened at media depictions of his mother as a scheming, ruthless golddigger, Michael decides to help her, but when he asks a lawyer to prepare him to testify, he slowly reveals pieces of a chilling secret. Flinn (Breaking Point ) creates a compelling premise and format, alternating between the past year and the present. Michael remembers how Walker, his rich stepfather, beat and controlled his mother (Michael is so afraid to leave her that he quits the football team, even though he's about to start as quarterback). When he meets Kirstie, a carnival worker who shares a troubled past, they form a fast bond; she encourages him to join her world ("We don't talk about our pasts here"). But when he does, Kirstie's gone, and he learns he "can't escape who I was, or what I still am." Although the contrivances wear thin—both Walker and Michael's mother are too one-dimensional to seem believable, and fans of the genre will easily guess Michael's big secret—the juicy story and edgy narration will likely hook readers. Ages 14-up. (Apr.)