I'LL MEET YOU THERE

Skylar’s post-graduation mission to get out of tiny Creek View, California, is sidetracked by her mom’s downward spiral into alcohol abuse and by hot hunk Josh Mitchell’s return from a tour in Afghanistan minus a leg.

A collage artist intent on getting to San Francisco State, Skylar’s home situation is both motivation to go and a ball and chain that keeps her from leaving. Skylar’s two besties, Chris and Dylan, are unable to help. Chris is busy hankering after Dylan when he’s not focusing on college in Boston in the fall, and Dylan’s baby is taking up almost as much of her time as his daddy, Jesse, does. Part-time work at the Paradise Motel believably brings Josh and Skylar together to connect and flirt, observed by their beloved and unbelievably undemanding boss. Ominous moody moments contrast with the happy, soaring—and steamy—times, and of course they are followed by the inevitable, completely devastating low. Demetrios (Something Real, 2014) again focuses on timely issues, interspersing Skylar’s account with short chapters in Josh’s anguished voice that relive his painful wartime memories. Skylar is almost preternaturally naïve, an abstemious virgin surrounded by hard-partying, foulmouthed, slur-slinging classmates all too conscious of their limited futures and all too willing to try to forget it temporarily with bad sex.

A heady, page-flipping romance.