Folded Notes from High School

The year is 1991, when teens didn’t communicate through texts but through handwritten notes stuffed into lockers, desks, and mailboxes. In a novel that captures the lingo, fads, and teenage preoccupations of the period, actor and TV writer Boren makes a charismatic debut as he traces the ups and downs of Tara Maureen Murphy’s life through notes exchanged between friends and enemies. Although Tara is dying to get out of her “two-bit town” and study acting at NYU, she intends to enjoy her senior year, getting star roles in the school’s plays, being half of a “supercouple” with her hockey-player boyfriend, and reuniting with her best friend, who has been away for the summer. Things don’t go as she expects. Tara’s year is full of drama, but most of it occurs outside the theater. A brash, egotistical heroine determined to get what she wants at any cost, Tara suffers setbacks at every turn. Even if she doesn’t win readers’ hearts, she will make them smile with her conniving antics, sarcastic wit, and tremendous resiliency. Ages 12–up. (Apr.)