Revolution by Jennifer Donnelly is a novel that focuses on a teenage girl struggling with the tragic death of her younger brother. The girl, Andi, is failing most of her classes in her senior year, apart from her music class- her true passion. However, making an A in one class is not cutting it for her prestigious Brooklyn preparatory high school, and she is forced to write an outstanding thesis in order to not be expelled from the school. Due to the death of her brother Truman, her family has been torn apart- her father is no longer living at home, her mother has seemingly gone crazy, and Andi herself is suffering from Depression. Andi’s estranged father, a renowned geneticist, suddenly arrives back in Brooklyn, making an effort to save Andi from expulsion. He takes her with him to Paris, France in order to work on her thesis while he does research on a heart that could have possibly belonged to Louis-Charles, the “Lost King of France.”
With all of this talk of the French monarchy and French Revolution, Andi finds herself dragged into the suspense and interest of it all, and when she finds an abandoned diary dating back to the Revolution, she is completely sucked into the author’s life. The diary’s author is a teenage girl named Alexandrine, suffering from the effects of the French Revolution, and many parallels are drawn between the two characters. Throughout the novel, Andi finds herself through the diary, meets new friends that change her life, finds love in Paris, and discovers a healthy way to deal with the death of her brother.
This is an amazing book with just the right mix of adventure, romance, and history. The research on the French Revolution and France is astounding, and because of Andi’s passion for music, musical terms are also accurate and incredibly in depth. This is an entertaining and enlightening read!
By: Kynlie Freeman
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