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Reviewed by:
  • Ordinary Ghosts
  • Deborah Stevenson
Corrigan, Eireann Ordinary Ghosts. Scholastic, 2007328p ISBN 0-439-83243-8$16.99 R Gr. 9-12

The death of his mother has given Emil Simon a fair amount of latitude at his private day school, latitude he's not afraid to exploit. Underneath the opportunism, however, lies roiling grief, not only at his mother's passing but at the unexplained departure of his glamorous older brother, Ethan, which has left Emil largely alone, except for the few times his stern father tears himself away from his work. Emil mainly relies on drugs and his loyal friend, Soma, to get through the days, but he recently has acquired a secret opportunity: a key that will let him into the majority of buildings on campus. Illicitly roaming the campus at night, he finds a girl, Jade, with whom he gradually builds a relationship; he also begins to find hints that he doesn't understand the real story behind his family's traumatic losses. Corrigan is a superb storyteller, and her Salingeresque tale keenly depicts not only her troubled narrator's emotional struggles but also the emotional components to the physical landscapes he vividly inhabits: his home, foundered on the wreck of family tragedy, and his school, thick during the day with manipulatable adults and heedless kids (Holden's "phonies" are Emil's "douchebags") but transformed at night into a place of possibility that both entices and disappoints. Emil's voice is rueful and poignant while still remaining credibly that of a guy knee-deep in teenaged guyhood, spending [End Page 409] much of his time in chemically altered states and desperately relying on the support of his best friend while trying to avoid anything resembling serious conversation with him. Aficionados of Portman's King Dork (BCCB 5/06) will be moved by this darker look at family secrets and maturation.

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