EAST OF EVERYWHERE

In Pogorzelski’s YA novel, an orphaned teen finds community in a small town.

It’s the mid-1950s, and 17-year-old Janie Emery has just arrived in the town of Montours City by bicycle, homeless and friendless and looking for work. She thought she experienced her “One Terrible Thing” 10 years ago, when her father was killed in World War II, but the subsequent decade brought only more tribulations: the death of her mother, which forced her and her brother, Brayden, to go live at the Anthers Hall orphanage; her move to a new orphanage, separating her from Brayden and from her best friend, the bookish Leo Wesley; and her risky choice to run away from St. Anthony’s and get back to Brayden, hoping to rescue him once she turns 18 in a matter of days. For now, she’s looking for work and a place to sleep. She finds a job with Mr. Calhoun, a kindly local handyman who is helping to rehab the mansion that Henry Mayhew, the scion of a wealthy local family, is turning into a home for sick children. She doesn’t plan to stay long, but she’s soon drawn into the tragedy-scarred lives of those around her, including Henry; his mother, Imogene; and Janie’s new housemate, Callie Webster. As she writes letters to Leo, perhaps she will finally be able to confront past traumas. Pogorzelski’s prose is effectively measured and exact, as when Joanie lies in bed in a boardinghouse: “Someone downstairs was playing the piano—and not very well, it would seem. Janie rolled over in her bed and stared at the beams that ran across the ceiling, listening to tiny hands hit the same three notes again and again and again.” Jane Eyreis mentioned several times, and, indeed, the novel unfolds at a Brontë-an pace that may turn off readers who are used to speedier YA fiction. Even so, Janie will win readers over as the story unfolds. Although the twist at the end is slightly predictable, the general reading experience is enjoyable.

An often solemn but immersive story about finding a new home.