What We Saw at Night
Buy the Book: Amazon, Barnes & Noble, Books-A-Million, IndieBound, Audio Published by: Soho Teen
Release Date: January 8, 2013
ISBN13: 978-1616951412
Overview
Allie Kim suffers from Xeroderma Pigmentosum: a fatal allergy to sunlight that confines her and her two best friends, Rob and Juliet, to the night. When freewheeling Juliet takes up Parkour—the stunt-sport of scaling and leaping off tall buildings—Allie and Rob have no choice but to join her, if only to protect her. Though potentially deadly, Parkour after dark makes Allie feel truly alive, and for the first time equal to the “daytimers.”
On a random summer night, the trio catches a glimpse of what appears to be murder. Allie alone takes it upon herself to investigate, and the truth comes at an unthinkable price. Navigating the shadowy world of specialized XP care, extreme sports, and forbidden love, Allie ultimately uncovers a secret that upends everything she believes about the people she trusts the most.
Praise
Spring 2013 Kids’ Indie Next Pick
“Allie’s…voice [is] honest and real…fascinating looks at both Parkour and a disease so unconventional that it turns the lives of patients and families upside down.”
—Booklist, High Demand Review
“Dangerously addictive, breathtakingly beautiful, terminally awesome.”
—Lauren Myracle, New York Times bestselling author of Shine
“A thrilling ride through the darkness… Dark, suspenseful and quietly beautiful.”
—Melissa Walker, author of Small Town Sinners
“The plot is intricately woven, with twists at every turn. Mitchard’s exemplary writing takes a masterful detour into young adult territory.”
—Karin Slaughter, New York Times bestselling author of Criminal
“What We Saw at Night is an engaging blend of real-world drama involving a life-and-death illness and a whodunit thriller. Imagine John Green’s recent The Fault in Our Stars in a mashup with a Nancy Drew mystery. Plus some roof jumping and wall scaling.”
—Pittsburgh Post-Gazette
“The fast pace is set from the beginning with Juliet’s dazzling jump across the buildings… recommended for readers who enjoy a unique twist on realistic fiction.”
—VOYA Magazine
“Atmospheric, melancholy… breathtaking.”
—Publishers Weekly
“This latest from Mitchard is quickly paced and intricately plotted, with flares of humor cobbled into the dialogue…. The suspense will keep [readers] engrossed.”
—Kirkus
“An interesting page-turner…the cliff-hanger ending will have most readers waiting for the next installment.”
—School Library Journal
“Allie seizes control of her life, complete with the risks it contains… although the pace of the book accelerates and dangers press close—whatever’s ahead, Allie can face it.”
—Beth Kanell, Kingdom Books Bookstore
“WHAT WE SAW AT NIGHT is a well-crafted, well-paced crime thriller about friendship, disability, first love and the choices we make about how to spend our short time on this earth.”
—TeenReads.com
“What We Saw At Night is a very unique book in many ways. I loved the writing, the mystery, the suspense, and the characters. There is nothing formulaic about it at all, which was also refreshing.”
—One Day YA
Excerpt
Don’t move and don’t scream too loud, no matter what you see,” Juliet told Rob and me. “Promise? On pain of death?”
“I promise,” I said readily.
Rob shot me a furious glance. I forced myself to shrug with a chilly deadpan.
What else was I supposed to do?
Juliet was a force of nature. I could ask her why we might scream. I might as well chew on air. She wouldn’t tell us. She was my best friend—in fact, aside from Rob, my only real friend—and the sum total of what I truly knew about her would have filled a teaspoon. She’d probably spent two hundred days at my house, and I’d spent another hundred at hers. None of that mattered. Still, I was always guessing at how headstrong she was and how unattainably different . . . and we were about to see that proven all over again.
