Second Star by Alyssa B. Sheinmel

Published: May 13th 2014 by Farrar, Straus and Giroux (BYR)

A twisty story about love, loss, and lies, this contemporary oceanside adventure is tinged with a touch of dark magic as it follows seventeen-year-old Wendy Darling on a search for her missing surfer brothers. Wendy’s journey leads her to a mysterious hidden cove inhabited by a tribe of young renegade surfers, most of them runaways like her brothers. Wendy is instantly drawn to the cove’s charismatic leader, Pete, but her search also points her toward Pete’s nemesis, the drug-dealing Jas. Enigmatic, dangerous, and handsome, Jas pulls Wendy in even as she’s falling hard for Pete. A radical reinvention of a classic, Second Star is an irresistible summer romance about two young men who have yet to grow up–and the troubled beauty trapped between them.

This book reeled me in from the first sentence. Sheinmel has an elegant, dream-like quality to her writing. The prose is absolutely gorgeous and the reader can’t help but give their heart Wendy.

The ocean setting is stunning and vivid for the reader. It is a world I would gladly escape to at any given chance. A great interpretation of ‘Neverland.’ Sheinmel is so perfect with her description it is almost as though you can hear the gulls and the sounds of the waves. *Sigh*

I first read Peter Pan this year, yes I know, what have I been doing all these years without ever reading Peter Pan? I instantly connected the parallels and sections that alluded to the tale of Neverland.

I admired the courage and strength that Wendy exhibited. She would go to the ends of the earth to protect her siblings and those she loves.

Ultimately the ending is unexpected. Many readers were disappointed with how this story ended. I am not one of them.

The open ending was fantastic, true to Peter Pan it leaves Second Star open to interpretation and each reader can take away something different from his or her experience with the book.