The Holloway Girls

May 16, 2022
Like generations of Holloway girls before her, music-loving baker Remy Holloway enters her kissing season at 16, a year in which any boy she kisses will be blessed with good luck. But when longtime crush Isaac Fuller experiences a frightening fall immediately after they kiss, followed by a constant string of bad luck, Remy and her peers become convinced that she’s the first cursed Holloway. Heartbroken and angry, Remy pulls away from friends and family, and when new neighbors, twins Tobin and Juliet Curcio, individually express romantic interest in Remy, she hesitates. She swore off kissing for the remainder of her season, or at least until she can break the curse, and refuses to let her deepening feelings for Tobin shatter her resolve. Raising questions about consent, the narrative often disregards Remy’s desire to abstain from kissing despite the Holloways’ rule: “Both you and the person you kiss must do so willingly.” Though repetitive beats lower the stakes, Crispell’s (The Secret Ingredient of Wishes, for adults) YA debut handily encapsulates first love’s heady drama with a fanciful premise. Most characters cue as white. Ages 13–up. Agent: Jenny Bent, Bent Agency.