Helpful Score: 1
This is the tale of a sixteen-year-old girl caught in a mix of love, mystery, Broadway glamour, and Mob retribution in 1950 New York.
When Kit Corrigan arrives in New York City, she doesn't have much. She's fled from her family in Providence, Rhode Island, and she's broken off her tempestuous relationship with a boy named Billy, who's enlisted in the army.
The city doesn't exactly welcome her with open arms. She gets a bit part as a chorus girl in a Broadway show, but she knows that's not going to last very long. She needs help - and then it comes, from an unexpected source.
Nate Benedict is Billy's father. He's also a lawyer involved in the mob. He makes Kit a deal - he'll give her an apartment and introduce her to a new crowd. All she has to do is keep him informed about Billy...and maybe do him a favor every now and then.
I did not like the style of writing and the book skipped constantly from current times (1950s) to past times in Kit's life. I felt like I was jerked one way and then the other. The suspense of the book was the only thing about the book that kept me reading. The ending of the books fell flat for me for some reason as well. It was just ok in my opinion.
When Kit Corrigan arrives in New York City, she doesn't have much. She's fled from her family in Providence, Rhode Island, and she's broken off her tempestuous relationship with a boy named Billy, who's enlisted in the army.
The city doesn't exactly welcome her with open arms. She gets a bit part as a chorus girl in a Broadway show, but she knows that's not going to last very long. She needs help - and then it comes, from an unexpected source.
Nate Benedict is Billy's father. He's also a lawyer involved in the mob. He makes Kit a deal - he'll give her an apartment and introduce her to a new crowd. All she has to do is keep him informed about Billy...and maybe do him a favor every now and then.
I did not like the style of writing and the book skipped constantly from current times (1950s) to past times in Kit's life. I felt like I was jerked one way and then the other. The suspense of the book was the only thing about the book that kept me reading. The ending of the books fell flat for me for some reason as well. It was just ok in my opinion.
Reviewed by Monica Sheffo for TeensReadToo.com
Kit Corrigan is an eighteen-year-old from Providence who moves to New York City in the 1950s to break into show business. But her dreams of Broadway stardom aren't as attainable as she had hoped.
Instead, she finds herself working as a chorus girl, practically homeless, and desperate to forget the misfortunes that seem to follow her family everywhere.
One night during a performance, she spots a piece of her past better left forgotten - the father of her former love. He's wealthy and dangerous, and offers her a luxury apartment for free, no strings attached. It seems too perfect to be true. And it is.
Kit soon finds herself trapped in a web of lies that threaten to consume her. Will she make it out of Nate Benedict's claws?
Just as with her debut novel, WHAT I SAW AND HOW I LIED, Judy Blundell brilliantly captures the essence of the time period while providing the reader with easily relatable characters. She taps into the mob mentality that was so crucial to the 1950s, and creates a story as intoxicating as any Broadway show.
Judy Blundell is one of my favorite authors, and will easily become a favorite of yours, too!
Kit Corrigan is an eighteen-year-old from Providence who moves to New York City in the 1950s to break into show business. But her dreams of Broadway stardom aren't as attainable as she had hoped.
Instead, she finds herself working as a chorus girl, practically homeless, and desperate to forget the misfortunes that seem to follow her family everywhere.
One night during a performance, she spots a piece of her past better left forgotten - the father of her former love. He's wealthy and dangerous, and offers her a luxury apartment for free, no strings attached. It seems too perfect to be true. And it is.
Kit soon finds herself trapped in a web of lies that threaten to consume her. Will she make it out of Nate Benedict's claws?
Just as with her debut novel, WHAT I SAW AND HOW I LIED, Judy Blundell brilliantly captures the essence of the time period while providing the reader with easily relatable characters. She taps into the mob mentality that was so crucial to the 1950s, and creates a story as intoxicating as any Broadway show.
Judy Blundell is one of my favorite authors, and will easily become a favorite of yours, too!
I have mixed feelings about the use of flashbacks for telling the story. While it enabled me to get hooked on the story early on, and the flashbacks built on the story and helped explain what was happening, they also slowed down the pace.