Turnabout - Softcover

Haddix, Margaret Peterson

Softcover

ISBN 10: 144244603X ISBN 13: 9781442446038

Publisher: Simon & Schuster Books for Young Readers, 2012

Synopsis

What if you became younger each year? A redesigned edition of a suspenseful, futuristic adventure that Kirkus Reviews calls “intriguing, thought-provoking, and certainly original.”

In the year 2000, Melly and Anny Beth are near the end of their natural lives when they are selected to participate in Project Turnabout. Turnabout’s injections make them grow younger, though at some point, all the participants are to receive another injection that will stop the unaging process. But it turns out there’s a catch: Everyone who receives the second shot dies. So Melly and Anny Beth flee the project and survive on their own as their lifespans reverse. By 2085, the pair is in their teens, and it’s only a matter of time before they’ll need a caretaker. With a reporter on their trail and their old memories fading fast, they desperately need to find someone they can trust with the truth—before they’re too young to talk.

About this title

About the Author:

Margaret Peterson Haddix is the author of many critically and popularly acclaimed YA and middle grade novels, including the Children of Exile series, The Missing series, the Under Their Skin series, and the Shadow Children series. A graduate of Miami University (of Ohio), she worked for several years as a reporter for The Indianapolis News. She also taught at the Danville (Illinois) Area Community College. She lives with her family in Columbus, Ohio. Visit her at HaddixBooks.com.

From School Library Journal:

Grade 6-10-Eighty-five years ago, Melly and Anny Beth were old women participating in a highly secret research study that reversed the aging process. However, the directors of Project Turnabout couldn't halt the reversal, and the women have "unaged" back into teenagers. Soon they will become so young that they will no longer care for themselves. Even worse, a reporter's interest in Melly is threatening to destroy the privacy that the teens alone still value in the publicity-mad culture of the year 2085. The suspense is unflagging as the two flee from unwanted exposure and search for a way to live out the rest of their days. The futuristic setting, including the consensual media circus of daily life, is scarily believable. The girls are well drawn, distinct characters, their teenaged selves logical extensions of their adult personas with one important difference: Melly and Anny Beth have learned from the mistakes of their "first lives" and accomplished more the second time around. The novel ends with the suggestion that longer life might be a blessing, an unusual perspective in science fiction and fantasy for young people, where extreme longevity is often depicted as a burden. Recommend this one to fans of Michael Crichton and Robin Cook, or pair it with Natalie Babbitt's Tuck Everlasting (Farrar, 1975) for a thoughtful discussion about human life and human potential.
Beth Wright, Fletcher Free Library, Burlington, VT
Copyright 2000 Reed Business Information, Inc.

About this edition

• Publisher: Simon & Schuster Books for Young Readers
• Publication date: 2012
• ISBN 10: 144244603X
• ISBN 13: 9781442446038
• Binding: Paperback
• Number of pages: 224