Title: The Martin Chronicles

Author: John Fried

Genre: Contemporary     

Publisher: Grand Central Publishing     

Format: Hardcover

Pages: 272

Rating: 3.5/5 stars

*Warning: Mature content. Parents please be advised*

Synopsis (Goodreads):

A powerful and heartfelt coming-of-age novel that follows Martin Kelso as he grows up in 1980s New York and faces the magic of first experiences, as well as the heartbreak of hard-won life lessons.

Martin Kelso’s comfortable world starts to change at the age of eleven. Girls get under his skin in ways he never noticed before. His cousin Evie, who used to be Marty’s closest confidante–the one who taught him the right way to eat a pizza and how to catch tadpoles–has grown up into a stranger, mysterious and unpredictable. Marty and his best friends once inhabited fantasy worlds of their own making, full of cowboys and cops and robbers, where the heroes always won the day. But now, as neighborhood kids are attacked on their walk to school, they find themselves wanting to play a new game that better prepares them for real life.

As life changes quickly and Marty feels less secure with himself, the difference between games and reality, friend and foe, and right from wrong becomes much more difficult to distinguish. At the same time, this new world offers possibilities as exciting as they are frightening.

This poignant debut perfectly captures the intense emotion, humor, and earnestness of young adulthood as Marty, age eleven to seventeen, navigates a series of life-changing firsts: first kiss, first enemy, first loss, and, ultimately, his first awareness that the world is not as simple a place as he had once imagined.

Review:

Thank you @grandcentralpub for sending me a copy of this book!

The Martin Chronicles centres around a character named, you guessed it, Martin, and it’s about the coming of age of Martin from being a young kid to being an adolescent to being a young adult. We see many changes to Martin as he grows up in 1980s New York and his struggles with friendships and other relationships! His relationship with his cousin Evie is kinda weird, but also kinda heartwarming as she is described as a kind of sister to Martin. Yet Martin is at that stage in life where it’s all about him so I don’t think he realizes the importance of this relationship until later in the book!

I kinda got a Catcher in the Rye vibe from this book, which was not a favourite of mine but still enjoyed. This book is not as dark as Catcher in the Rye, but had that feeling of trying to figure things out? I don’t really know how else to describe this connection!

Overall a pretty interesting read!

Happy reading!