In Matt de la Peña's (Mexican WhiteBoy) compulsively readable thriller, a new disease attacks and runs rampant through the poor population in the U.S. on the border of Mexico, and a tsunami threatens the lives of passengers and crew on a luxury liner.
High school student Shy Espinoza, who narrates, takes a summer job with the Paradise Cruise Lines to make money for his family back home in San Diego, Calif. Six days into the voyage, a passenger says something cryptic to Shy ("This is the face of your betrayer"), then jumps overboard. De la Peña gradually reveals a complex set of connections between the man who committed suicide, several passengers aboard the ship and Shy himself. Shy feels helpless when he finds out from his mother that his cousin now shows the same symptoms of the disease that killed his grandmother. Shy has never been exposed to the casual way in which the wealthy talk down to the crew. When a tsunami hits, Shy winds up in a damaged lifeboat with the daughter of the dead man's business partner.
The breakneck plot will draw readers in, but Shy's discoveries about how the world is skewed toward those in power, and his decisions to do the right thing, will hold their attention. Shy emerges with a clear conscience and a bittersweet understanding of where he belongs--even if he hasn't quite decided which is more destructive: Mother Nature or human nature. --Jennifer M. Brown, children's editor, Shelf Awareness