Ratings

Content Ratings based on a 0-5 scale where
0 = no objectionable content and
5 = an excessive or disturbing level of content

Guide to Rating System

LANGUAGE

VIOLENCE

SEXUAL CONTENT

ADULT THEMES

Title: Comeback

Author: Vicki Grant

Ratings Explanation

Sexual Content:  Ria’s boyfriend Colin pressures her to consummate their relationship.  She puts him off for another week.  Ria is anxious to move in with her father, since he has more liberal attitudes towards young lovers.  A week later, Ria, stretches out on the front seat of car and says, “Come here,” to Colin.  Ria then returns to her mother’s home at 3 a.m. and frantically checks her buttons to make sure they are done up correctly.

Adult Themes:  Ria’s mother divorces Ria’s father.   Ria’s father, Steve Patterson, is a wealthy stockbroker, who fakes his own death.  He then becomes suspect in stealing his investor’s money.

Synopsis

Ria is devastated by her parent’s divorce.  She resents her mother.  Ria’s mother divorced her father, Steve Patterson, a charismatic, wealthy, stockbroker.  Now, that Ria’s life is crumbling, she realizes how great her life was.  Ria lives in a tiny condo with her mother and younger brother in an older part of town.  Everyone loves Ria’s father and no one can comprehend why her mother left him.  Ria’s solution is to move in with her father, where she will enjoy a  nicer lifestyle and her father’s more liberal attitudes towards young lovers.  Ria’s father then disappears in a plane crash and is presumed dead.  Colin, Ria’s boyfriend, comforts her until rumors begin to surface that Steve Patterson defrauded his clients of $100 million dollars.  Colin avoids Ria, and she is completely devastated.  She hastily grabs her younger brother, Elliott, to escape the media blitz at her home and they run away.  Ria sells her get-away car for twenty dollars and purchases bus fare to a town called Cypress.  Ria and Elliott hole up in an abandoned cabin at a summer camp, a desolate, quiet place during autumn.  One night Elliott’s breathing becomes labored and Ria realizes that in her haste, she neglected to bring his asthma inhaler.  Ria turns on her phone to find a message from her “presumed dead” father.  She contacts him, and the police and Steve Patterson, in handcuffs, rescue Elliott.

This book was written at a 4th grade level with mature content.   Comeback is part of the Orca Soundings series – a line of high-interest/low reading level books geared at reluctant teen readers.  If you have difficulty convincing your middle school reader to pick up a book, then this book may pique their interest, and help build confidence.

©2010 The Literate Mother