{"id":597,"date":"2011-07-20T11:05:01","date_gmt":"2011-07-20T16:05:01","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/www.glbtrt.ala.org\/reviews\/?p=597"},"modified":"2011-07-20T11:05:01","modified_gmt":"2011-07-20T16:05:01","slug":"sleeping-angel","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.glbtrt.ala.org\/reviews\/sleeping-angel\/","title":{"rendered":"Sleeping Angel"},"content":{"rendered":"

Herren, Greg. Sleeping Angel.<\/em> Valley Falls, NY: Bold Strokes Books, 2011. Paperback. 237pp. $13.95. ISBN: 978-1-60282-214-6.<\/a><\/p>\n

\"\"Sleeping Angel<\/em> is Greg Herren\u2019s first YA novel. He has two previously successful series of mysteries set in New Orleans. This novel is also a mystery, but not in the traditional sense. It follows Eric Matthews, who wakes up in the hospital after an automobile accident with amnesia. In the car is the dead body of a former friend, Sean Brody. The boys were childhood friends until Eric discovered that Sean was gay and then started bullying him among other openly gay acquaintances. When Eric is released from the hospital, he enlists a former girlfriend to help him piece together what happened before the accident and to try to recover his memory.<\/p>\n

The action in the book is well paced and keeps the reader\u2019s interest with a mixture of flashback and present day action. The novel does have the traditional Herren plot point that the main character has some psychic abilities. The major downfall with Sleeping Angel<\/em> is that it feels like an Afternoon Special<\/em>. The plot points sometimes seem very contrived and heavy-handed. Without giving too much of the plot away, I was very disappointed with the final resolution of the main character\u2019s bullying.<\/p>\n

I applaud Mr. Herren\u2019s attempt to add to the continuing debate on gay bullying, but I think that the positive role models in his adult fiction have been much more successful.<\/p>\n

Sleeping Angel<\/em> has little to offend, but there is some sexual content. The novel is appropriate for any teenage reader, but probably would not interest older teens. I recommend this book to public libraries that have a large collection of YA gay fiction, but not to libraries with limited resources.<\/p>\n

Reviewed by, Scott Clonan<\/strong>
\nAdult Services Librarian
\nWest Charleston Library<\/em><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

Herren, Greg. Sleeping Angel. Valley Falls, NY: Bold Strokes Books, 2011. Paperback. 237pp. $13.95. ISBN: 978-1-60282-214-6. Sleeping Angel is Greg Herren\u2019s first YA novel. He has two previously successful series of mysteries set in New Orleans. This novel is also a mystery, but not in the traditional sense. It follows Eric Matthews, who wakes up […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1167,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":[],"categories":[31,21],"tags":[],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.glbtrt.ala.org\/reviews\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/597"}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.glbtrt.ala.org\/reviews\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.glbtrt.ala.org\/reviews\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.glbtrt.ala.org\/reviews\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1167"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.glbtrt.ala.org\/reviews\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=597"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.glbtrt.ala.org\/reviews\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/597\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.glbtrt.ala.org\/reviews\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=597"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.glbtrt.ala.org\/reviews\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=597"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.glbtrt.ala.org\/reviews\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=597"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}