How to Fall

Sixteen-year-old Jess Tennant is spending her summer in the idyllic small town of Port Sentinel on the English shore, but not by choice. Her beautiful cousin Freya died in a fall from a cliff the summer before, and Jess’s mother is there to support her twin sister, Jess’s aunt. Within days of arriving, Jess is mistaken for Freya by half the town (“As far as they were concerned, Freya was back from the dead. Awkward wasn’t the word”), and she becomes interested in this cousin she never met, and whether her death was truly an accident or suicide, as most people believe. Irish crime author Casey (the Maeve Kerrigan series) makes a foray into YA with this fast-paced thriller, first in a planned series. Jess is hard-edged, blunt, and aggressive—the kind of heroine who doesn’t cower when she’s met with hostility by some of the local teens who knew Freya, and who isn’t going to be dissuaded from finding out what really happened to her cousin. Ages 12–up. Agent: Ariella Feiner, United Agents. (Aug.)