The Last True Love Story by Brendan Kiely (English) Paperback Book

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"Hendrix and Corrina bust Hendrix's grandfather out of assisted living, and leave LA for New York in pursuit of freedom, truth, and love"--

FORMATPaperback LANGUAGEEnglish CONDITIONBrand New Publisher Description

From the New York Times bestselling and critically acclaimed coauthor of All American Boys and author of The Gospel of Winter comes a cool, contemplative spin on hot summer nights and the classic teen love story as two teens embark on a cross-country journey of the heart and soul. The point of living is learning how to love. That's what Gpa says. To Hendrix and Corrina, both seventeen but otherwise alike only in their loneliness, that sounds like another line from a pop song that tries to promise kids that life doesn't actually suck. Okay, so: love. Sure. The thing about Corrina--her adoptive parents are suffocating, trying to mold her into someone acceptable, predictable, like them. She's a musician, itching for any chance to escape, become the person she really wants to be. Whoever that is. And Hendrix, he's cool. Kind of a poet. But also kind of lost. His dad is dead and his mom is married to her job. Gpa is his only real family, but he's fading fast from Alzheimer's. Looking for any way to help the man who raised him, Hendrix has made Gpa an impossible promise--that he'll get him back east to the hill where he first kissed his wife, before his illness wipes away all memory of her. One hot July night, Hendrix and Corrina decide to risk everything. They steal a car, spring Gpa from his assisted living facility, stuff Old Humper the dog into the back seat, and take off on a cross-country odyssey from LA to NY. With their parents, Gpa's doctors, and the police all hot on their heels, Hendrix and Corrina set off to discover for themselves if what Gpa says is true--that the only stories that last are love stories.

Author Biography

Brendan Kiely is the New York Times bestselling author of All American Boys (with Jason Reynolds), Tradition, The Last True Love Story, and The Gospel of Winter. His most recent book is The Other Talk: Reckoning with Our White Privilege. His work has been published in over a dozen languages, and has received the Coretta Scott King Author Honor Award, the Walter Dean Meyers Award, and ALA's Top Ten Best Fiction for Young Adults. A former high school teacher, he is now on the faculty of the Solstice MFA Program. He watches too much basketball and reads too many books at the same time, but most importantly, he lives for and loves his wife and son. Find out more at BrendanKiely.com.

Review

** STARRED REVIEW ** "poetic, lovely, and profound...Satisfying and full of longing, the book features deep feelings, full hearts, and heartbreak. It speaks to the importance of forging connections and the power of story to capture memories and meaning."-- "VOYA"**STARRED REVIEW** "Readers will be swept up in Kiely's musical prose as Teddy learns about love, romance, forgiveness, and reconciliation."-- "Kirkus Reviews, starred review"**STARRED REVIEW** "A sophisticated story about the power of love, music, and making amends. Deeply personal and universal at the same time, Kiely's truly lovely tale should find a home in every YA collection." -- "School Library Journal, starred review""This bittersweet, sometimes humorous coming-of-age journey hits all the right notes, with its emotional language, vivid landscapes, and quirky characters...A good fit for new adults, graduates of Joan Bauer's Rules of the Road, or those who enjoyed John Green's Looking for Alaska." -- "Booklist"Genuine, thoughtful, and heartbreaking, The Last True Love Story is the kind of book that kickstarts an awakening in your soul and will resonate with readers for years to come.--Julie Murphy, New York Times Bestselling author of Dumplin' and Side Effects May Vary"The Last True Love Story is a tender multi-generational story that's as much about the meaning of family as it is about falling in love. There's plenty of delightful adventure, but what I loved most about this book is its respect for moments that can be both quiet and life changing at once."--Ava Dellaira, author of Love Letters to the Dead"As cool as it is tender, this poignant story about the power of love thrums with classic rock and aches with honesty. I was so moved by Hendrix's journey and, as a brown girl who loves music, I was completely invested in Corrina--one of my new favorite characters in all of YA. Authentic and beautifully written, The Last True Love Story will truly capture your heart."--Jasmine Warga, author of My Heart And Other Black Holes"Brendan Kiely's writing soars off the page, ultimately landing someplace between heartwarming and heart-aching (but definitely somewhere in the heart). Here is a book about music, friendship, first and final loves, and all the blue notes in between. Indeed, The Last True Love Story may be exactly that."--David Arnold, bestselling author of Mosquitoland"Some authors write with their hearts first and their heads second. Some the other way around. But Brendan Kiely manages, as always, to strike a skillful and delicate balance between deep, intellectual coming-of-age and poetic, emotional drama. The Last True Love Story stands in a league of its own both in regards to the way it portrays its teenage protagonists and the way it tells the very personal, tragic story of Alzheimer's. If the point of living is learning how to love, to quote Gpa, then I think we should all start by reading Mr. Kiely's beautiful novel."--John Corey Whaley, Printz and Morris winner, National Book Award finalist, and author of Highly Illogical Behavior

Review Quote

"This bittersweet, sometimes humorous coming-of-age journey hits all the right notes, with its emotional language, vivid landscapes, and quirky characters...A good fit for new adults, graduates of Joan Bauer's Rules of the Road , or those who enjoyed John Green's Looking for Alaska."

Excerpt from Book

The Last True Love Story CHAPTER 1 THE IMPOSSIBLE PROMISE The day before we busted out of town and raced into the wide, windblown roads of America, I stood three floors below Gpa''s apartment, staring across the beach to the water, clutching a newly framed photo of two dead people. Calypso Sunrise Suites Assisted Living Facility was plopped halfway between the Santa Monica Pier and the Venice Beach boardwalk, but in this strange nonlocation between the two, if nobody cruised by in front of me, and I looked past the few palm trees twisting up out of the sand, and the stretch of beach beyond them, and into the endless expanse of the Pacific--it could seem as if I was marooned on the edge of an island, lost and forgotten at sea. At least that''s how I felt as I stood there and gathered my strength to bring the photo back up to him. The week before, Gpa had smashed the glass and frame while having one of his fits, and although I''d been able to salvage the photo without it bending or tearing, I''d sliced up my palm and fingers on the glass. But at least I''d saved the photo. In it, Gma, her hair whipped up in one of those sixties beehives, stood in front of their old wood-paneled station wagon, holding the bundled infant version of my dad. Gpa hadn''t meant to ruin it, because it was his favorite one of her, but he''d swept it off his desk with everything else in a burst of rage, and it had shattered against the base of his floor lamp. I''d spent half an hour carefully vacuuming the area around his desk. My hand still hurt, especially with Old Humper''s leash double-wrapped around it. He was going at it with the leg of a bench along the boardwalk, but I didn''t mind because I liked to let him get it out of his system before walking into Calypso, where pets were welcome, but not if they were going to get their freak on with any of the residents, guests, or staff. Still, he was small for an Amstaff, and with his dopey tongue hanging out over his teeth, the little guy could charm a smile out of a corpse. He finally grew tired and yawned to let me know, so I took him around the corner to the parking lot and up the steps to the front entrance. None of the residents at Calypso were made of big money, but the place was still a wide, block-long, three-story complex with common rooms, an in-house bistro, an art studio, communal terraces, and a large garden off to one side, with a fountain and a few trees surrounding it, where I often met Gpa and listened to his stories, or read him poetry. I knew most of the friendly, blue-polo-shirted staff, and I waved hello to the folks at the front desk as Old Humper and I crossed the lobby. I checked the garden first--Gpa wasn''t there--and then doubled back to the elevator to head up to Gpa''s apartment. I knocked on the door. There was no answer, so I opened it and poked my head in. "Damn," I said. Gpa was having another bad day. The room was wrecked. His bed was askew, the sheets rumpled like frozen waves at the foot, and his clothes were scattered haphazardly across the floor. He had pulled and emptied the dresser drawers from the unit and tossed them toward the door to the bathroom. Even that room was destroyed. He''d flung open the cabinet doors beneath the sink and knocked his prescription bottles, shampoo, toothpaste, and deodorant into the tub. It wasn''t the real Gpa who''d done all this. It was the man who took over when he was having a fit--the man with a storm behind his eyes. A man I didn''t recognize. And sometimes, when it was really bad, when he looked out at me from under his angry brow, I was afraid he might not recognize me, either. But to say it wasn''t him, to say it really was someone else standing by the window in his room, was shitty on my part. It wasn''t fair to say that. This was Gpa. I had to get used to that, and I needed to figure out how to help him. He stood in his usual outfit, the gray slacks, the two-tone guayabera, and he had his shoes on, which was a good sign, because it meant he''d probably left the room earlier that day. He stared out the window, over the boardwalk and the sand, and gazed into the Pacific. "Gpa," I said to his back. "Gpa, it''s me, Teddy." I let go of Old Humper''s leash, and he raced over to Gpa, nuzzled his leg, then came back to me, as if looking for direction, and I wished I could give him one. I walked across the room and repeated who I was as I approached Gpa. He kept his back to me, and I didn''t want him flailing out at me suddenly, as he might, so I didn''t touch him. I stepped to the side and leaned against the wall. In the late-afternoon sunlight, his cheeks were a golden sheen of tears. "Gpa," I said again. Someone knocked on the door behind us. It opened before I could say anything, and two of Calypso''s polo-shirted brigade stood in the doorway, two massive beefcakes, Julio and Frank, who looked like the football players at school who puffed out their chests when they walked and hung their arms about a foot away from their bodies like they needed to constantly air out their pits. Julio and Frank showed whenever there was Red Alert Trouble in one of the residents'' rooms, or if someone was lost in the middle of the bistro, or the lobby, during one of the organized activities, or during a meal. "Everything okay?" Julio asked, coming into the room, knowing full well it wasn''t. "We need Dr. Hannaway?" "No," I said. Gpa breathed in and out softly and wiped at the tears on his cheeks, so I knew he''d already calmed down and the rage had passed. He was quiet because he was scared. His eyes darted from me to the window and back. He probably didn''t know why he''d torn up the room. It was possible he didn''t even remember that he was the one who''d done it. Old Humper rubbed Gpa''s shin, and Gpa bent down to scratch him. "I got this," I told the giants. "Doubt it," Frank said. His bald head glistened as he dipped beneath the doorframe and stepped into the room. "Charlie?" he said to Gpa. I stepped in front of them. "Seriously." I put my hand up. "I got this. I do." Julio frowned. He nodded to the desk with all the drawers open and the pens, paper, and magazines pushed to the carpet around it. "Come on, Teddy," he said. "We''re professionals." "And I''m family," I said back. In fact, Gpa was about all I had for family. There was Mom, of course, but she was usually gone on one business trip or another, always working, gone that week, in fact, to Shanghai, and I saw Gpa more than I saw her, even though he no longer lived with us. Mom had probably only seen him twice in the seven months since she''d stuck him at Calypso. So it was just Gpa and me and Old Humper, because Dad was gone too, and gone for so long we never even spoke about him. My dad: dead. "I know, buddy," Julio said. "But sometimes you have to let us handle these things. You can''t do it all alone." I wasn''t Julio''s buddy. I wasn''t frigging twelve, either, even though he spoke to me like I was on a middle school field trip, not the seventeen-year-old who was basically trying to keep his family together, or what was left of it, while the rest of the world didn''t give a flying fart if the Hendrix family just disappeared like one of Gpa''s memories: poof, as if we never existed at all. "Gpa," I said again. I stepped to the side, so I wouldn''t surprise or startle him. "Gpa, it''s me. Teddy. We''ve got a job to do." Teddy. We''ve got a job to do. He must have said that a million times to me as I was growing up. Mom was always working. It was just me and Gpa. Teddy. We''ve got a job to do. We would wash the kitchen floor. Teddy. We''ve got a job to do. We would sit down and finish my essay for homework. Teddy. We''ve got a job to do. And we would head over to St. Christopher''s Kitchen, where we''d cook for the homeless who washed up like driftwood on the beach and the boardwalk. Gpa turned from the window, and I knew he was Gpa again. The old war hero, the disciplinarian--the half-smile that rose in the corner of his mouth was anybody else''s full smile. The clouds had passed from his eyes. "What are we looking for?" I asked him, risking the peace of the moment. Julio and Frank hovered skeptically, as if they were waiting for Gpa to take a swing so they could shout See! I told you so! "That photo," Gpa said. "The one with your grandmother standing next to our station wagon." "Of course," I said, trying to stay as calm as possible. "Our favorite one." Gpa nodded to me, the half-smile remaining. "Yes, exactly. Our favorite." "Guys?" I said to Julio and Frank. "A little space?" They were reluctant at first, but Gpa assured them he was fine, and I did too, and as I started to clean up the clothes, Gpa began to fix the bed. Old Humper marched a line back and forth, keeping the giants on one side and us on the other. Eventually they left, and I thought about how the tables had turned and I was helping Gpa, like a parent helps a child, just as he had helped me when he came out to fill the hole left behind by Dead Dad. But I also still felt like a damn kid, because I didn''t know what to do. As I got the dresser unit back together and put the clothes away, I couldn''t decide if I should tell Gpa I had the photo or not. I could easily pretend I''d found it under the bed, or I coul

Details ISBN1481429892 Author Brendan Kiely Short Title LAST TRUE LOVE STORY R/E Pages 288 Audience Age 13-17 Publisher Margaret K. McElderry Books Language English ISBN-10 1481429892 ISBN-13 9781481429894 Format Paperback DEWEY FIC Year 2017 Publication Date 2017-09-05 Imprint Margaret K. McElderry Books Edition Description Reprint ed. Audience Teenage / Young adult We've got this

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