Moonglass

When Anna was little, she and her mother used to search for sea glass, but since they looked at night, they called it moonglass. Now, ten years after her mother's mysterious death, her father is working as head lifeguard on the same beach where her mother grew up and her parents first met and fell in love.

Reluctant to get close to anyone (including her father) and not pleased about having to start at a new school, Anna begins to spend more time alone, running the length of the beach and wondering about who her mother really was. After meeting a lifeguard named Tyler, she slowly lets her guard down and together they start exploring the abandoned houses that dot the beach.
But when learning more about her mother's past leads to a painful discovery, Anna must reconcile her desire for solitude with ultimately accepting the love of her family and friends.



This book was not at all what I thought it was going to be. For some reason, I thought I had read somewhere that it was going to be about mermaids, which wasn't true at all. Mermaids influenced the story, but they weren't a major part of it. That being said, I definitely wasn't disappointed with Kirby's debut.

Anna's story was beautiful, and a perfect read for the beginning of summer. The whole thing centered around Anna's love for the beach, and, being a San Diego native myself, I was sucked in by the descriptions of the ocean. You forget how much you've missed something until it's right there in front of you (figuratively, if not literally).

The characters in the novel were pretty well-developed. At times, they seemed a little flat, but for the most part they were well-rounded three-dimensional characters. I feel like Anna successfully completed her journey as the main character, and there were visible changes in her by the end of the novel. Tyler was the only one who wasn't all that complex (in my opinion), but he was still a likeable guy and a joy to read.

Overall, I enjoyed Moonglass. I would definitely read other books by Jessi Kirby, and I'm hoping that she's got something else in the works. It was refreshing to read a book that's not part of a series for once, but I'm a little sad at the fact that contemporary seems to be the only YA genre that can put out a singleton these days. I'm anxious to see what's in store for this author's career at any rate. Check it out for yourself!

J