About the Book
Jess Wong is Angie Redmond’s best friend. And that’s the most important thing, even if Angie can’t see how Jess truly feels. Being the girl no one quite notices is OK with Jess anyway. If nobody notices her, she’s free to watch everyone else. But when Angie begins to fall for Margot Adams, a girl from the nearby boarding school, Jess can see it coming a mile away. Suddenly her powers of observation are more a curse than a gift.
As Angie drags Jess further into Margot’s circle, Jess discovers more than her friend’s growing crush. Secrets and cruelty lie just beneath the carefree surface of this world of wealth and privilege, and when they come out, Jess knows Angie won’t be able to handle the consequences.
When the inevitable darkness finally descends, Angie will need her best friend.
Guest Post: “More Than Friends”
In A Line in the Dark, the main character, Jess Wong, has a deep and sometimes painful crush on her best friend, Angie Redmond. Jess is aware of her own feelings, but at the same time she tries to ignore them as much as she can. For Jess, the line between friendship and something more — something romantic — is a blurry one, and it’s hard for her to keep her feelings in check.
I think that for a lot of queer girls first coming to understand their sexual orientation, this is a common experience. Girls often have close and intense friendships with each other, and those friendship feelings can seem so similar to romantic feelings. Indeed, many people fantasize about their friendships turning into romances — friends-to-lovers is a common romance trope.
The reality, of course, is that friends-to-lovers is not easy to accomplish in real life. First, it requires both friends to have those romantic feelings for each other, which isn’t always the case. And it requires changing your perceptions about your friend in ways that aren’t always apparent when you’re “only” friends. While friend relationships can feel very close and intense, there’s an added layer of intimacy with a romantic relationship. Being involved romantically with someone makes you vulnerable in a way that a friendship normally does not.
The space between friends and “something more” is so charged with emotion: desire, longing, fear. It’s messy and vulnerable and full of drama. A novel needs all of these feelings.
Whether Jess and Angie will become more than friends is a spoiler, but I can tell you this: Without Jess’s desire to be more than friends, nothing in A Line in the Dark would have happened.
About the Author
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Malinda is new to me, but this book sounds awesome. I love YA thrillers/mysteries and there aren’t many good ones out there. Thanks for hosting!
I loved this explanation of the difference between close friends and romantic relationships. It sounds liek this novel will be emotional, suspenseful, and exciting to read with so much at stake for these characters.
Thanks for the review! Friends to lovers has always seemed to complicated to me. This book sounds fabulous though.
I looked at the book cover and expected a Halloween themed plot :)) Surprised to find no ghosts, but the topic of friendship and sexual orientation is definitely an interesting one!
Oh, first of all YAS to that cover, and secondly, YAS to Malinda Lo!
Queer girls walking the line between friends and lovers, SIGN ME UP!
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