Home > Librarians@Random > BookTalks

SHADES OF SIMON GRAY Joyce McDonald Hardcover Delacorte Books for Young Readers | October 2001 | $15.95 | 0-385-32659-9 | Ages 12 up

Secrets dating back 200 years plague the town of Bellehaven, and now sixteen-year-old Simon Gray, a “computer geek,” is at the center of another one. A model student and good citizen, Simon has never gotten in any type of trouble until three older students manipulate him into breaking into the school’s computer network and accessing advance copies of tests. One night Simon crashes his car into the Hanging Tree, the site of a legendary lynching, and strange and eerie things begin to plague the town. What is the meaning of the sudden swarm of frogs? Why are crows lying dead across the area? What has caused the unexpected outbreak of the West Nile Virus? The entire town is perplexed. While Simon lies in a coma, the nervous teens begin to wonder whether he will reveal their secret if he awakens. Meanwhile, Simon leaves his body and encounters the ghost of Jessup Wildemere, the man who was lynched at the Hanging Tree for a murder he didn’t commit. Then Simon awakens to the face the “truth” regarding his own crime. But, does he tell?

COPYRIGHT

Prepared by Pat Scales, Director of Library Services, the South Carolina Governor’s School for Arts and Humanities, Greenville, SC

For more on this book

Return to THIS MONTH’S FEATURED BOOKTALKS