Small Damages

Starred review from May 14, 2012
As Kenzie’s senior year of high school begins, her beloved father dies suddenly. Her mother’s coping mechanisms—pack his things, start a business, join Match
.com—push Kenzie closer to her friend Kevin, and by spring, she’s pregnant. Kenzie’s mother’s response (which feels more 1896 than 1996, when the story is set) is to arrange for Kenzie to move to a bull farm in southern Spain, where she’ll work until the baby is born and given up for adoption. The wrinkle in this soulless plan is that Kenzie is conflicted; her story is written as a tender, honest letter to her unborn child. Kenzie arrives in Spain sullen and resentful—she’s chopping onions with Estela, the farm’s cook, while her friends are at the Jersey Shore—and the distance brings her predicament into sharp relief. Estela is a better mother than her biological one; Esteban, the teen in charge of horses, a more standup guy than Yale-bound Kevin. This beautifully written “summer of transformation”
story will have readers feeling as torn about Kenzie’s choice as she is. Ages
14–up. Agent: Amy Rennert, the Amy Rennert Agency.

Starred review from June 1, 2012
A young woman is forced into unexpected territory when she is packed off to a vividly imagined, shimmering Spanish countryside in order to conceal an unexpected pregnancy. Provided by her mother with only the barest of details about a couple that wishes to adopt her baby, Kenzie finds herself an unofficial apprentice in the kitchen of the home of a successful bull breeder connected to the prospective adoptive parents-- a world away from where the talented filmmaker expected to be following her high school graduation. In an introspective first-person narration, Kenzie's story effortlessly unfolds. Her initially strained relationship with terse Estela, the marvelous chef charged with her safekeeping, eventually melts into a mutual trust. Readers will sympathize deeply with Kenzie's emptiness over her father's death, which led the way to a loving but uncommitted relationship with her baby's father, a longtime friend. Parallel to Estela's history is a tale set against Franco's rule, which poignantly serves to help Kenzie sort through her numbed confusion. Characters are never simple in this gorgeous landscape so masterfully described by National Book Award-finalist Kephart; fully engaging in their lives--touched as they are by gypsies and bullfighters and the tragedy of war--will require an audience that is willing to be swept up by unfettered romanticism. Lovely and unusual--at once epic and intimate. (Fiction. 13 & up)

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July 1, 2012

Gr 9 Up-Kenzie is 18 and pregnant, much to the embarrassment of her mother and her Yale-bound boyfriend, Kevin. Feeling helpless and alone, she submits to her mother's plan to keep the mistake hidden by going to stay with friends of friends in Spain for the duration of the pregnancy and giving up the baby to adoptive parents. In a daze, Kenzie finds herself on a dusty bull farm, Los Nietos, hot and lonely, experiencing a lifestyle that is completely different from her former life. But it is in this unknown landscape that the young woman finds the support that she lacks at home. The cranky old cook, Estela, and the mysterious young horseman, Esteban, become the nurturing mother and attentive friend that Kenzie yearns for, and she becomes the kind of person who can take care of herself and her baby. Beautifully told, the characters' stories are soulful and compelling, and the setting is rich and alive. While the subject matter might seem familiar, even overdone, this story is unexpectedly tender and original, never falling prey to cliche or the trappings of the typical teen problem novel. Or if it does-the moodiness, the somewhat easy resolution-the style is so engaging that the tale is still fulfilling.-Jennifer Miskec, Longwood University, Farmville, VA

Copyright 2012 School Library Journal, LLC Used with permission.

July 1, 2012
Grades 9-12 Single and pregnant, teenage Kenzie is sent to Spain by her mother to carry her baby to term and then give it up for adoption. Why Spain? Because her mother is determined that no one should know of the pregnancy. Sent to live with a friend of the friend, Kenzie is desperately unhappy, missing her own dead father, and conflicted in her feelings about Kevin, her baby's father. Gradually, though, Kenzie finds herself falling in love with Spain and discovers an unlikely friend and ally in an elderly and stubbornly strong-willed cook. And then there is the mysterious and darkly handsome Esteban. At first an unsympathetic protagonist, Kenzie gradually begins to change and becomes more likable, though her story is often deliberately told and slow in pace. The real star of this ambitious novel, however, is Spain itself, which Kephart brings to vivid life, leaving the reader anxious to learn more about the country and its people.(Reprinted with permission of Booklist, copyright 2012, American Library Association.)

January 1, 2013
Exiled to Spain for the course of her pregnancy, eighteen-year-old Kenzie haltingly ponders her complicated, loosely interrelated relationships. Seeking acceptance from her unsupportive boyfriend, her ashamed mother, the potential adoptive couple, and Estela, her stand-in mother figure in Spain, Kenzie seeks tenuous self-acceptance. Though enticing, the dreamlike writing fails to bind the many threads together, and Kenzie's eventual epiphany lacks impact.

(Copyright 2013 by The Horn Book, Incorporated, Boston. All rights reserved.)