LEARNING TO FLY

Seventeen-year-old Jason is having a hard time adjusting to life as a new Chinese immigrant in a small Ontario town. His parents have split, and he must work long hours in his mom’s deli to help out. Lonely and disenfranchised, he’s made no friends, save the potheads he gets stoned with, and is often the butt of school bullies’ jokes. Then he meets Chief, a First Nations teen whose life is much harder than his own. When Jason is arrested for marijuana possession while making a buy from his dealer and Chief’s sister dies from an overdose, the two loners lean on each other to make it through. Like other Orca Soundings titles, this novel discusses high-interest topics like drug use, racism and bullying at a comprehension level that is comfortable for reluctant readers. Yee, the author of several works for teen readers, employs a spare writing style that is well suited to this format. Interested readers may also enjoy his similarly themed short-story collection What Happened This Summer (2006). (Fiction. 12-14)