Each Night Was Illuminated

Cassie Blake always wanted to be a nun, but she struggles with her faith after witnessing a horrific accident, in this spiritual tale. Cassie was 11 when she and visiting friend Elias Jones watched a train crossing the bridge into exurb Green Valley, N.J., plummet into the reservoir, killing six people. Seven years later, Cassie—still processing the trauma of what she saw—has lost her faith in God, is coping with chronic insomnia, and ignores Elias’s letters from Australia. But suddenly Elias is back in Green Valley for the summer, preparing to attend college. Hoping to reconnect, he invites her to help him look for ghosts; though Cassie agrees, she’s skeptical that his high-tech gear, which includes an infrared sensor to uncover ectoplasm, will bear fruit. When Elias pulls a prank on Cassie’s contentious priest that backfires, and a harrowing incident threatens to upend his future, Cassie must contend with looming disaster, both internal and external. Though the disjointed plot occasionally stalls forward momentum, Anderson (Midnight at the Electric) uses Cassie’s contemplative and resilient voice to detail a true-to-life exploration of one teen’s shifting relationship with faith. Most characters read as white; Elias has a Bangladeshi grandparent. Ages 14–up. [em]Agent: Rosemary Stimola, Stimola Literary Studio. (Sept.) [/em]