AustLit

'"YOUNG BROTHERS JUMP TO DEATHS: LOVED SAME GIRL" reads the headline; months later the girl, 15-year-old Sally O'Leary, tries to unravel the grief and guilt of the tragic events whose misrepresentation has been part of her trauma. Sally first met Benji and his blind older brother, Joel, at a school debate on life after death--a possibility that fascinates Joel. As Sally gradually reveals in excerpts from her diary, in memories she confides to the reader, and in conversations with the psychiatrist to whom she's sent as a seriously disturbed truant, Joel later seeks her out to pursue their debate. Benji, whose parents require him to be Joel's guide and companion, makes a third in their growing friendship. It's never quite more than that; though Benji and Sally are attracted to each other, Benji "must not take that hope, or enjoy your love when it is what my brother wants most." Joel seeks meaning in New Age philosophy and the occult; and, trying to divert him from what they perceive as perilous ideas, Joel and Sally concoct a horoscope that Joel disastrously misconstrues.'

Source: Kirkus Reviews.