The Official Description: One lost soul graffiti artist. The sweetest boy ever. Will they save each other or go down in flames?
Echo is a brilliant artist but he’s not a good bet. He’s running from a suspended sentence and trying to pay off a debt that’s about to cripple him, literally. When he gets involved with a drug gang, his life goes from bad to worse. Until he meets Peri.
Peri is like sunshine. He’s innocence and good things—he’s home. Spending time with Peri is saving Echo’s life in so many ways. Peri teaches him sign language, teaches him the important things in life don’t always need words to express them. And more than that, Peri shows him how even the most broken heart can heal.
But Echo is trouble and he wants to save Peri from getting hurt. If only falling in love wasn’t so bloody impossible to stop.
If you like lost boys being found and love redeeming even the most hopeless of situations, you’ll love Sometimes There’s Stars.
Just the facts: LGBTQIA characters, redemption, trying to do right.
Suki Fleet is one of my favourite authors. Their writing is like poetry. This story is full of emotion, even though one of the main charaacters hardly speaks. Simply beautiful – Kinzie Things
My thoughts bit: Echo is a graffiti artist who got in heaps of trouble. He’s on the run from a loan shark and a suspended sentence. As he tries to dig himself out from under the rubble of his life, he seems to just fall into even more trouble.
He’s out one night involved in a drug deal when Echo (like a bat) sees Peri (like the chicken), get hit by a car. He’s injured and Echo finds himself wanting to take care of the young man he’s just met. Peri brings out something fiercely protective in Echo.
At the same time as Echo’s life seems to be unraveling, Peri is like a beautiful burst of warmth and light. Peri has an uncategorized disability that makes speaking and writing difficult for him. But he knows that he wants to be near Echo. The problem is that Echo doesn’t think he’s a “good bet.” He’s convinced that he will just drag everyone down. And Peri is far too perfect and innocent to be exposed to the way that Echo lives his life.
I really appreciated the way that the author approached Peri’s neurodiversity. It’s not that he’s broken… in fact, he communicates better when he’s able to use sign language. I thought that was not only a lovely idea but also very possible. I have studied American Sign Language myself and different parts of the brain are engaged when people communicate using signs. It made perfect sense to me that Peri would find signing easier… after all … it’s a conceptual language.
Peri and Echo are sweet together. I loved how slowly their relationship moved. In combination with Suki Fleet’s lyrical writing, this plot is painful at times, but always rich and engaging.
Things You May Want To Know: Please be aware, I’m by no means an expert on what may or may not have the potential to disturb people. I simply list things that I think a reader might want to be aware of. In this book: (SPOILERS) Description of extreme beating, Description of drug deals, a character is struck by a car and injured, a character is hospitalized with a head injury, a character is put in an induced coma, a character has developmental issues, character experiencing homelessness, a character is extremely intoxicated.
Links: Goodreads // The Author /
I purchased a copy of Sometimes There’s Stars by Suki Fleet
Kinzie Things 