Extraordinary Means by Robyn Schneider. Unabridged downloaded audiobook. Eight hours, seven minutes. Read by Khristine Hvam and James Fouhey. HarperAudio, 2015.
Seventeen-year-old Lane had his life mapped out. He's number two in his graduating class and planning on applying early action to Stanford. Then drug-resistant tuberculosis derails his plans. Instead of attending his AP classes, he's at Latham House, a sanatorium for teens with the disease. He thinks he can keep up with his studies and become well enough to leave. He's also captivated by Sadie and her group of cool friends. He knew Sadie from summer camp when they were thirteen but he was too shy to talk to her.
Sadie remembers Lane alright and is still furious with him for standing her up at a camp dance. Sadie has been at Latham House for over a year. She's not getting better but she's not getting worse. She has cultivated her cool persona very carefully and is a bit terrified of getting well enough to return to the real world, where she was definitely not cool.
This dual narrative makes its way down a predictable path but, the characters are interesting and the idea of a TB epidemic among teens is intriguing. The narrative doesn't go into the hows and whys of it though. Khristine Hvam is one of my favorite narrators and James Fouhey is new to me. They did a good job and sounded appropriately young.
This story should appeal to teen fans of tragic romance like The Fault in Our Stars.
I downloaded this book from Audiobooksync's Free Summer Audiobook program. If you don't already know about it, check it out for next summer! The "summer" is already over (it starts in May), but they post links to download two audiobooks each week for thirteen weeks.
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