Items related to The Free Fall
Synopsis
When her family begins to fall apart, sixteen-year-old Let is torn between two interesting and unconventional boys, as she slides into the dark side of alcohol, illegal drugs, and sexual activity in the wealthy suburbs of Detroit. A first novel.
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About the Author
Jane Ratcliffe writes about music for VH1, Interview, American Music Guide, HOUR Detroit, and the Detroit News and is currently pursuing an MFA at Columbia University. She is also collaborating on a screenplay with documentary filmmaker Sue Cohn. She is a practicing Tibetan Buddhist, takes in about every stray cat she passes and thinks life will end shortly if she doesn't get to travel. She lives in New York City.
Reviews
Grade 8-11-Violet, known to friends as Let, gets a brand-new car for her 16th birthday. She has begun to look for what she calls "the shine," which is her way of describing people and feelings that are strong and powerful. She meets Henry, an older boy with a wild streak, and believes he has this "shine." She also meets Ryder, who seems to be searching as well. Henry is distant, hard, and dangerous; Ryder is gentle, earthy, and drinks too much whiskey. With these two boys, Let steps into a spiral of drugs and alcohol that whirls out of control, into what she describes as a "free fall." Her dysfunctional parents, who are dealing with their own issues, seem unaware that she has begun this decline, even when her new car is dented. Let's brother, Logan, is troubled as well, and adds turmoil to her family. This morality play, set in Detroit's ultra-rich suburbs, features unsupervised teens drinking, partying, and doing drugs. There's sex, plenty of street language, but also a search for spirituality and God. Ratcliffe has done a good job of opening Let's mind to readers, but the book tries to answer too many questions. Teens will relate to Let's precarious search for meaning, but may not have the patience to ramble along to the book's tragic ending.
Angela J. Reynolds, Washington County Cooperative Library Services, Aloha, OR
Copyright 2001 Reed Business Information, Inc.
Violet Gwendolyn Hitchcock, called "Let" by her friends, is the disarming 16-year-old narrator of Ratcliffe's engrossing first novel. Let is searching for "the shine" (an elusive feeling of "grace"), but she looks in all the wrong places. Nevertheless, she maintains an aura of innocence even as she slowly surrenders to a downward spiral of alcohol, drugs and sex. The author sustains sympathy for her heroine by making readers privy to the obsessive thoughts that begin to drown out the girl's rational impulses, as well as the sense of humor that keeps her afloat. For instance, as Henry, the 19-year-old man of her dreams, begins to pressure Let sexually, she says to herself, "The thing was, I did want to be with him, just not quite like that. Not quite so all at once. I guess I was wanting at least a first date." Other scenes in which a note of comedy takes the edge off of Let's fears: her best friend, CJ, instructs her on how to apply a condom, and her first time snorting coke. But the cumulative effect of Let's breezy tone has strange repercussions when, inevitably, tragedy does strike: readers may come away ultimately unruffled by the event. Ratcliffe also sets up the novel as a flashback, and Let's judgment in hindsight occasionally detracts from the developing action. Still, readers will keep the pages turning as this credible protagonist chronicles her disturbing descent. Ages 14-17.
Copyright 2001 Cahners Business Information, Inc.
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