Bound To Stay Bound

School Library Journal - 07/01/2024 Gr 8 Up—Adriana has no idea how she ended up at the Compass Juvenile Detention Center. Sure, she's made some bad choices and associated with the wrong people, but she never did anything illegal herself. When she helps the wrong friend at the wrong time, she's left holding the bag and sentenced to seven months in juvie. She's just biding her time, dreading the awkward visits from her family, and trying to stay out of trouble until she loses her journal and it mysteriously reappears with notes from a stranger. Jon knows exactly why he is at Compass, but no one else knows the truth but his counselor. Rumors abound about what crime landed him in the detention center for his entire high school career. When he finds an uncatalogued book in the library and discovers it is an illicit journal from an inmate on the girl's side, he can't help but share his critique with the author. This modern-day Romeo & Juliet story is told through alternating viewpoints, letters, and poems. Instead of family obligations keeping them apart, Jon and Adriana are separated by bad choices and an unjust system. The mystery of what Jon did to deserve his stay at the facility, and the truth, will break readers' hearts. VERDICT Hand this book to readers who enjoy emotionally raw, true-to-life stories like Saints of the Household by Ari Tison or Long Way Down by Jason Reynolds.—Sara Brunkhorst - Copyright 2024 Publishers Weekly, Library Journal and/or School Library Journal used with permission.

Booklist - 06/01/2024 Adriana, part Moroccan and a high-school junior, enters Compass Juvenile Detention Center for a seven-month sentence. She is angry and anxious and needs every instinct she possesses to survive and figure out whom to trust. During library time, she accidentally leaves her journal behind. When it reappears days later (shelved next to The Book Thief), a boy has added an anonymous entry. Adriana replies, incensed, and leaves the journal in place. So begins a correspondence, sometimes in prose, often in poetry from slam to lyrical to power ballad. Jon, 17 and Black, has been incarcerated for years. Both seek second chances, but if they manage to course correct, it won’t be thanks to the manipulative psychologist or racist guards at Compass. Gradually, they fall in love. But the facility is segregated; how can they meet? Each recruits their closest allies to the heist-like effort, a thrilling chance to outsmart the system. Late tonal shifts and one-dimensional adults mar the narrative, but this smoothly plotted, suspenseful, heartrending novel deftly portrays time inside high-security juvenile detention. - Copyright 2024 Booklist.