Shark Beneath the Reef - Hardcover

Grade 6 Up-- In the United States of the 21st century, 69% of the adult population is alcoholic, and a chain of government-regulated rehabilitation centers called Soberlife is flourishing. It is the law that minors can commit their parents to a Soberlife facility, as 14-year-old Sam has had to do with his mother in the hope of shielding his younger brother Ollie from her disease. The control which Sam exerts over the lives around him is monumental but has left him with no life of his own. In the end he finds that controlling others is only an illusion, and that Ollie has not been shielded but deeply wounded by his family's deception. The final note of this depressing scenario, however, is a hopeful one. Sam and his mother reveal themselves to each other for the first time and bond together in love and acceptance. The plot has many messages but is not overburdened. The characters of Sam, Ollie, and their mother are vivid, and the sense of foreboding surrounding Ollie's actions carries readers as the point of view shifts with each chapter. A strong story that delivers the chilling realization that the future which Brooks portrays is not very distant. --Nancy Curtin, Port Washington Public Library, N.Y.
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