250 Hours

by Colleen Nelson
PRMS discard paperback 152 pages
genre: YA realistic fiction

I had started reading this YAC (Young Adult Choices) novel during brief lunch breaks at school. I've decided not to add it to the collection.

Jess has been assigned community service for arson. Most of his fires are small - garbage can size - but one burns down a shed. He burns for the sense of control and he is always itching to start a new one. Jess' dad left years ago.

Sara Jean cares for her elderly grandmother, who is obese and diabetic. Her mother abandoned her when SJ was four.

This story had a lot of potential, but never seemed to go anywhere. Sara Jean is deciding between going to college and staying in town to marry Rich. Jess is torn between leaving the Indian reservation and staying near his kokum (grandma). Both young people struggle with missing parents. There was potential romance between the two. The book also dealt with the horrors of the schools the Indian children of a generation earlier had been forced to attend.

I'm donating the book.