Wuthering High

WUTHERING HIGH: A Bard Academy Novel: Cara Lockwood: MTV Books: Young Adult: 257 pgs.

After wrecking her father's car and running up a $1,000 bill on her stepmother's credit card, fifteen-year-old Miranda is sent to a boarding school for delinquents on an island off the coast of Maine. Two friends, her occult-loving roommate, and Miranda are soon caught up in the mysterious disappearance of Kate Shaw, a student who attended the boarding school fifteen years earlier. As the students investigate, their lives begin to mirror the plots of the classic literature they are studying and they discover that their teachers are not what they seem.

I hated the first few chapters of this book. Miranda was a name-brand-dropping brat and her parents and sister were horrible stereotypes of bad families. Fortunately, Miranda is quickly moved to the island and the story becomes likable when she's away from her family and the focus is on the mystery. The book's premise of literature coming to life is very clever, and I truly wanted to find out what happened to Kate Shaw. This is not destined to be a classic, but it's an engaging mystery if you can get past the beginning.

MBC