TWO LIKE ME AND YOU

In
this YA debut, a high schooler befriends the class loner and a World War II
veteran.

Edwin
Green is a junior at J.P. Hornby High School in Hornby, Alabama. His
ex-girlfriend Sadie Evans became a celebrity after improbable events, revealed
later in the novel, that happened on April 13, 2014, which Edwin calls “Black
Saturday.” In the year since then, he’s been making YouTube videos in the hope
of becoming famous himself and winning her back. Then, one day in history
class, Edwin’s sad life is graced by Parker Haddaway, a gruff girl whom the
teacher makes his partner in a class project. They must ask someone who lived through
World War II a series of questions—and luckily, Parker knows just the man to
interview: 90-year-old Garland Lenox, who lives at the Morningview Arbor rest
home. They ask the cantankerous Air Force veteran about the first time he heard
the name Adolf Hitler, and he says, “Doesn’t ring a bell.” He’s teasing them,
of course, but the next time the teens visit, Garland has a serious proposal:
He offers Edwin $25,000 to help him secretly go to France and reunite with his
long-lost love, Madeleine Moreau. The notion is preposterous—but Edwin thinks
that if they can complete the mission, he’ll finally become world-famous. Gibbs
adds an unconventional sweetness, reminiscent of Jerry Spinelli’s 2000 novel Stargirl, to a tale of a trip to Saint-Lô, which the
Allies bombed during WWII. Along the way, the author crafts lines that
effectively illuminate both his snarky characters and modern society. Edwin,
for example, narrates, “for at least half the famous people out there fame just
fell on their heads like bird shit.” Garland, amid irreverent one-liners,
provides a wealth of firsthand experience about the Second World War and
midcentury America (“I joined the Air Force to get out of the damn woods and
see the world”). Parker loves 1990s rap music, and Gibbs sprinkles lyrics
throughout the story like confetti. As her fate intertwines with Garland’s and
Edwin’s, the meaning of the book’s title comes into flower. In the end, Gibbs
avoids easy, saccharine plot turns in favor of ones that strengthen his
characters.

A
smashing debut that’s both intimate and epic.