Teen Tuesday: Death Coming up the Hill by Chris Crowe

Death Coming up the Hill by Chris Crowe. 208 p. Houghton Mifflin Harcourt, October, 2014. 9780544302150. (Own.)

Teen Tuesday features Death Coming Up the Hill by Chris Crowe. This blank verse novel is told in a series of haiku. As if the constraints of the form were not challenging enough, the total number of syllables in this book add up to the total number of soldiers killed in Vietnam in 1968. 

Douglas Ashe is a senior in high school. He's about to turn eighteen and has no college prospects to help him defer the draft. His social studies teacher posts the number of soldiers killed in action each week and regularly discusses the politics of the war. His new girlfriend is opposed to the war. Douglas is considering dodging the draft and fleeing to Canada after graduation. Only a war of sorts is being waged in his home that may force him into a different decision. His parents marriage is loveless and their fighting has escalated. This verse novel is powerful and perfect for any kind of reader.