Keesha's House Book

An unforgettable narrative collage told in poems

Keesha has found a safe place to live, and other kids gravitate to her house when they just can’t make it on their own. They are Stephie – pregnant, trying to make the right decisions for herself and those she cares about; Jason – Stephie’s boyfriend, torn between his responsibility to Stephie and the baby and the promise of a college basketball career; Dontay – in foster care while his parents are in prison, feeling unwanted both inside and outside the system; Carmen – arrested on a DUI charge, waiting in a juvenile detention center for a judge to hear her case; Harris – disowned by his father after disclosing that he’s gay, living in his car, and taking care of himself; Katie – angry at her mother’s loyalty to an abusive stepfather, losing herself in long hours of work and school.

Stretching the boundaries of traditional poetic forms – sestinas and sonnets – Helen Frost’s extraordinary debut novel for young adults weaves together the stories of these seven teenagers as they courageously struggle to hold their lives together and overcome their difficulties.

Publishers Weekly

In her first YA novel, Frost profiles seven teens in trauma, artfully revealed through sestinas and sonnets. With pregnant Stephie's opening lines, she conveys a bittersweet contrast typical of the collection: "My parents still think I'm their little girl./ I don't want them to see me getting bigger,/ bigger every week, almost too big to hide it now." Katie's stepfather tries to molest her, and Harris is thrown out of the house when he reveals that he's gay. Each character ends up at Keesha's house (the house really belongs to an adult named Joe, but teen Keesha, who has her own problems, looks after the arrangements and the kids who wind up there). Some characters simply pass through, while others form a family. The adults in their lives, such as parents, a judge and even Joe, offer other perspectives on the teens' lives. The struggles may be familiar, but Frost makes her characters and their daily lives seem relevant and authentic (in one poem, Katie describes how the smallest wrinkle-a new bus schedule-brings her to tears because she now won't have time to change for work; in another, Dontay dreads being tracked down by his case worker), often using striking imagery ("All my questions are like wind-tossed/ papers in the street," Stephie writes). Making the most of the poetic forms, the author breathes life into these teens and their stories, resulting in a thoughtfully composed and ultimately touching book. Ages 12-up. (Apr.) Copyright 2003 Reed Business Information.