Losing Gabriel

April 1, 2016
The lives of three high schoolers become deeply entangled around the birth of a child. After his mother's death, Dawson is furious that he and his father have moved to a small town in Tennessee. Then he spots magnetic Sloan, whose sexy voice and dynamic presence rock the stage. Lani is attracted to Dawson's easy good looks, but she never even talks to him in school. Unprotected sex, once, sweeps Sloan and Dawson into a relationship they never wanted. Sloan dreams of being a rock star, and Dawson is on track for college and career. It isn't until after the baby, Gabriel, is born with asthma and in need of around-the-clock care that Sloan runs off, and now nursing student Lani moves directly into Dawson's life. The story spans a decade, laboriously detailing Sloan's travails with the band (complete with drugs and sex) and Lani and Dawson's as they care for Gabriel but deny themselves their growing love for one another. All three of the young, white adults must rearrange their original goals to accommodate life's terrain, struggling with their own ambitions, love, disappointment, and devastating grief. The tale spools along like a Hallmark television drama, the author's third-person narrative dispassionate and bland despite the book's emotional landscape. A standard weeper. (Fiction. 13-18)

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May 1, 2016

Gr 9 Up-Pleasure reading for fans of romance twinged with tragedy. The lives of three middle Tennessee young adults are intertwined in McDaniel's latest love story. Sloan Quentin dreams of musical stardom as the way to escape her trailer-park upbringing. But when she runs from a cheating boyfriend into the arms of the new guy, her path takes an unexpected turn. Dawson Berke is fuming. His dad moves them from Baltimore to Windemere, TN, for his senior year. For his dad, it's the only way they can begin again after his mom's death, but Dawson is counting down the days until he can leave his new home for good. Alana "Lani" Kennedy has been working toward her dream of becoming a nurse since her cousin Arie died years earlier. When her life becomes entangled with Dawson's and Sloan's, her dedication to nursing will be rocked to the core. The bulk of the novel focuses on the characters as young 20-somethings. These three young adults are forced to grapple with making their own choices and accepting responsibility for those decisions. Filled with emotional highs and lows, this latest offering will resonate with fans of McDaniel's other works.

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