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    Bone Gap
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    Bone Gap
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    Bone Gap
    Ebook315 pages4 hours

    Bone Gap

    By Laura Ruby

    4/5

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    About this ebook

    National Book Award Finalist * Printz Award Winner for Best Young Adult Book of the Year

    “Ruby’s novel deserves to be read and reread. It is powerful, beautiful, extraordinary.”—School Library Journal

    Everyone knows Bone Gap is full of gaps.

    So when young, beautiful Roza went missing, the people of Bone Gap weren’t surprised. But Finn knows what really happened to Roza. He knows she was kidnapped by a dangerous man whose face he cannot remember.

    As we follow the stories of Finn, Roza, and the people of Bone Gap, acclaimed author Laura Ruby weaves a tale of the ways in which the face the world sees is never the sum of who we are.

    LanguageEnglish
    PublisherHarperCollins
    Release dateMar 3, 2015
    ISBN9780062317636
    Author

    Laura Ruby

    Laura Ruby is the Michael L. Printz Award–winning author of many books for adults, teens, and children, including Thirteen Doorways, Wolves Behind Them All and Bone Gap, both National Book Award finalists; the ALA Best Fiction for Young Adults selection York: The Shadow Cipher and its sequels; the Edgar Award nominee Lily’s Ghosts; and the Book Sense Pick Good Girls. She is on the faculty of Hamline University’s MFA in writing for children and young adults program and lives in the Chicago area. You can visit her online at lauraruby.com.

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    Reviews for Bone Gap

    4/5

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    • 4/5
      Bone Gap is a YA novel that blurs the lines between straight up fantasy and magical realism and draws on fairy tales.Bone Gap is a small town in rural America and the home of Finn and Sean O’Sullivan. Their mother left them years ago, and the brothers were alone until the beautiful Roza arrived in their lives. But Roza has disappeared again, and most of Bone Gap believes she left as mysteriously as she came. Finn O’Sullivan knows she didn’t. He knows what he saw, even if no one else believes him. Roza was kidnapped by a dangerous man in a black SUV. Searches turn up nothing, and Finn is unable to describe the man’s face. The town does not believe him, not even his brother Sean.It would be so easy for Roza to become nothing more than a quest object, but instead this is her story as much as Finn’s, Sean’s or anyone else in the novel. Bone Gap alternates viewpoints, at first mainly between Finn and Roza, but it later adds Sean and Petey’s viewpoint. While most of the town believes Finn must have been in love with the beautiful Roza, it is Petey, the ugly beekeeper, he loves.Aside from the magical realm the man spirits Roza way too, Bone Gap is set in the real world. Yet the entire novel is embedded with a sense of the magical, leaving you straining to hear the whispering voices of the corn fields.Roza’s story is an examination of the story of the woman who’s “fairest in the land.” In these stories, the woman becomes a prize to be won, an object to be fought over. No one sees the person, just the beauty. So it goes for Roza, for whom her beauty is more of a curse than a blessing. Roza is placed within the role of the damsel, but it is a role that she fights against.I think Bone Gap would appeal to people who don’t normally read fantasy novels. In particular, those with a love of mythology might enjoy it. All in all, this is a book that I would confidently recommend to anyone with a love for a deftly woven story.Originally posted on The Illustrated Page.
    • 3/5
      After finishing this YA "fantasy" book up a couple of days ago, I'm still not quite decided on where I stand. And maybe where I stand is "This would be great for semi-mature YAs - they'd totally connect with the storyline and characters!" Was it great for me, personally? It was just okay. It felt more like a realistic fiction novel than fantasy and in that regard I was disappointed. But did I keep reading? Yeah, I did, and not because I had to. So there's that.
    • 4/5
      This book received many honors, including the 2015 Michael Printz award, a National Book Award Finalist, and one of the top ten best fiction for Young Adults Top Ten.Few can write magic realism and make it work as well as Alice Hoffman or Sarah Addison Allen, yet Laura Ruby was successful in making this work in Bone Gap.While at times the plot seemed somewhat convoluted, I stayed with the book, and I'm glad I did. Bone Gap is a small town, one in which everyone knows each other. And, as usual, small towns have their noisy neighbors, their near-do-wells, and a smattering to those who try to rise above the fray and all that is stifling about small-town life. The book begins with the disappearance of Rosa who left the town as mysteriously as she entered. Finn saw the abduction, but cannot recall the details. Finn is known by many names throughout the town, most of them dealt with his inability to stay on track. We follow the story of Finn who hears the corn talk to him in his rural setting, who allows the nasty Rude brothers to pick on him and beat him up, and we also know that Finn has a gift of understanding people. He knows his brother loves Rosa, but he is to afraid to try to find herr.As Finn finds a love of his own and in this strength learns his abilities to face what seems impossible to rescue his brother's love. Only Finn can rescue Rosa, and it is a very difficult task. As the magic both prevents and aids him.Three and 1/2 stars!
    • 3/5
      I love Magical Realism, but this is not the kind of magical realism I'm accustomed to. Or at least I've never read anything like it before. I didn't mind that it was different from what I usually read, but my main issue with this particular story was that I didn't feel invested for a least eighty percent of it. I just couldn't wait to finish, I felt no connection to the characters or the story. Yes the writing was definitely good and I didn't dislike anyone really, I could sympathize with their troubles and thought the quirkiness of the town and the people were interesting, but I still wasn't able develop that deep invested connection. Also I kinda got this déjà vu, I've read this vibe from it, I was getting a beauty and the beast type of story. Overall it wasn't too much of a bad read for me personally since I didn't end up dnf'ing it.
    • 5/5
      A wonderful, rare work of YA magical realism.
    • 2/5
      I don't usually do audiobooks, but I have been taking a lot of long (5-10 mile) walks as part of my backpacking training and I am getting bored!!I picked some young adult titles because I am not a great listener, so YA works well for me. I did not realize this was magical realism until I got to the crux of the story and--ta-da! magical realism! difficult situation solved! So frustrating. The story was good up to that point, and I was so curious how it would be worked out.The narrator was fine, other than his female voices. Particularly his voice of Roza, a native Polish speaker. It was not good--it sounded like a 15-year-old making fun of someone. But, I will continue to try some more audiobooks.
    • 2/5
      Many thanks to Faber & Faber for providing me with an advanced copy of this book.Bone Gap is a hard novel to describe. I could call it a thriller but that's not all there is to it. I could call it a fantasy story, or a feminist faerie tale, but that doesn't quite cover it. To me, it's like the literary equivalent of Twin Peaks. It's about the disappearance of a girl from a town that's not quite right, seeming to exist as more of a gateway to another place, and how that disappearance affects the people that have been left behind. It's a very ambitious story but, unfortunately, I felt that it was often a bit too ambitious for its own good.Bone Gap is incredibly slow moving a rife with metaphor. It's a novel that you really have to pay attention to, as even the most insignificant occurrence could be vitally important to the plot. Unfortunately this also made it quite tiring to read. It's a long time before the tiny details start drawing together, forming a modern day retelling of a popular Greek myth. While everything does ultimately make sense, you really have to stick with it for well over two hundred pages to reach this point.The novel is pretty and lyrically written, but I often got the feeling that this masked an underlying weakness in the plot. Under Bone Gap's beautiful prose, there is little substance. It felt almost like two novels smooshed together - a beautiful fantasy story and sub-par mystery. So much of it felt contrived, from Finn randomly chasing his horse towards traffic out of the blue (the plot required his brother to be mad at him) to the fact that the police refuse to investigate a missing person's report. I felt that the story should have possibly focused on either one or the other, as the shift between the mundane and the fantastical was sometimes quite jarring.The characterisation in the novel also gave me some pause. One of the things I found most interesting about the novel was how it treated the concept of feminine beauty. We see this contrasted between the two female leads - Roza and Petey. One is beautiful (and is mistreated by a succession of men who are only interested in her because of it) and the other is considered ugly and pitied for it (because men will take advantage of her because of it). This was where Bone Gap was most interesting, in the way that it held the mirror up to society's treatment of women and showed how ugly it is.Yet the characters themselves often felt shallow. There are too many horrible men in book. Virtually everyone objectifies women to some degree, even if they initially seem to be caring and kind. The only truly nice man in the story is Finn. Even Sean, who is portrayed as a local hero, immediately assumes that Roza has just left him when she disappears. There also seems to be a lack of research in the Polish used in the novel. While I don't speak this language, a quick Google search revealed to me some errors in genders and spelling. I'd personally expect an author to put a little more research in if they wish to include a different language in the novel.In all, Bone Gap was very beautiful and offered some interesting food for thought, but I found it too slow and surprisingly shallow to read. It's not greatly memorable and I'd probably only recommend it to people who are fans of surrealist fantasy.
    • 3/5
      I didn't much care for the magical realism. Although the magical parts were integral to the plot, they didn't feel well integrated into the world of Bone Gap. I also felt that Finn's difficulties with facial recognition were dealt with in enough depth. It was an interesting twist and I wanted more, such as a section from Sean's perspective when he found out about it.Dan Bittner did a very good job narrating, especially in Roza's voice.
    • 5/5
      This novel of magical realism centers around a mysterious disappearance in a small town with unexplained gaps--gaps of memory and gaps between worlds. Finn doesn't fit in and can't figure out why; he witnessed the abduction of Roza, his brother's girlfriend, but can't describe the assailant; he's drawn to the beekeeper's daughter who is burdened by the town's prejudices; and he must travel between the gaps to save Roza.
    • 5/5
      This was an amazing read. The story kept jumping between reality and magic reality. Characters are believable. I dove into this novel, and just tore through it. I will read it again. The poetry of character's thoughts, feelings and perceptions was unexpected and delightful. Everything moved the story forward. So much magic, so much believable magic. This was a santathing surprise and I'm just thrilled with it!!
    • 5/5
      A slow burn of a young adult mystery with strong hints of magical realism that feels like riding a carousel at a very creepy abandoned carnival of ghosts.This book took me pleasantly by surprise - it started slow and quiet, but built itself up to stealthily into a burning climax. Wonderful usage of magical realism, fantastic twist, down-to-earth genuine romantic relationships between teens which is a rarity in YA lit, and a powerful message about love, and sight.
    • 4/5
      Unlike most reviewers, I enjoyed the buildup far more than the climax. The climax and "twist" (what the hell is the twist people are talking about?) were really flat, uneventful and, lackluster to me. Getting to know the characters was the best part of the book. Trying to figure out what was going on and how things would come together was far more rewarding than them actually coming together.
    • 5/5
      This subtly speculative novel about two brothers facing loss and a young woman fighting for her freedom from a kidnapper is absolutely gorgeous. I love the way each of the characters are portrayed and the magical realism of this small town, where everybody knows everything about everyone, even if they always get the story wrong.
    • 4/5
      This is a young adult book that was free this year in the audio sync program. One comment, there is a bit of sexual content, mild yes, no details but some heavy petting going on. A story set in Bone Gap, Illinois. I was pretty sure that it is fictional but, hey, who knew. If you google it there is a place called Bone Gap. The story features a rag tag bunch of characters; Finn the main character is described pretty much as a spacey kid, his brother Sean, Petey the beekeeper's daughter, Roza the girl from Poland here studying botany, the Rude Boys (bullies) and Charlie Valentine (not his real name). Besides the amusing array of characters there is a long list of animals; Calamity the Cat, the goat, the horse, the chickens, the dog in the lane, murder of crows, etc. Then there is the corn. The corn whispers. The story revolves around Roza going missing. But it also is told from different perspectives of Finn, Roza, Petey. Oh, and less I forget, there is a bit of botany (plants, gardening) going on as well. A pretty good story, maybe a bit too much stuff going on for some readers but after I settled into the story, I liked it. It also won quite a few awards or made some short lists. Having just read How to read Literature Like a Professor, I can recommend this book as a good exercise. If you want no spoils, don't read the rest. This story is based on the mythology of Persephone. Roza goes missing, Finn sees her leave and thinks maybe she wanted to go but he is not sure and he can't describe the man that takes her. He can't talk to Sean who loved Roza. Petey is mad at Finn for not being able to see her for what she is. Of course the story of Persephone is that she is the daughter of Demeter. Hades falls in love with her and takes her to Hades. Finn is on a quest, his quest is to find Roza but he also finds himself in this quest. Finn enters the corn, he finds the stream (river Styx), he "finds" Roza with his unique vision and he, Roza and Russ escape back through the corn to Bone Gap.
    • 5/5
      Just freaking awesome.

      Library copy
    • 5/5
      Wow! This is a wonderful story full of mystery, magical whispering, gateways to other worlds and lessons on how we see (and don't always see) the beauty in ourselves and others. Full of charming, rich characters and wonderful atmosphere.
    • 4/5
      To be honest, I’m not sure how to classify this novel. Paranormal? Fairy tale? Thriller? I can only say that it’s unique and well-written.Finn O’Sullivan has always been considered odd by the inhabitants of Bone Gap and have called him by various nicknames to reflect his oddness. This time it matters. Roza, a girl living in their spare apartment, disappears. Only Finn saw her kidnapper, but no one believes him. It’s been months, and everyone assumes the beautiful girl just moved on as mysteriously as she arrived and Finn is just being weird. Finn’s brother, Sean, feels abandoned because everyone has always left. He thought she was his future. All that matters is that no one looks for Roza.Finn never looks at anyone except Priscilla (aka Petey). Others look at Petey, but they mainly see her flawed looks. Finn only sees beauty. Suddenly, a magnificent horse appears in the O’Sullivan barn. This magical horse allows Finn to ride him. These rides take him to Petey, who is willing to give Finn a chance. Nothing is this simple.The novel is told in alternating points of view between Finn, Roza, and Petey with Sean being a presence. We don’t get much depth with Sean--he’s the brother who sacrifices his own dreams for everyone else. Finn truly is different, and he needs Sean--not forever--but he has needed him. Now, Finn is disappointed in Sean giving up and not looking for Roza, so Finn decides he’ll look. The kidnapper appears occasionally to taunt Finn, but no one sees him. Finn can’t describe him. We don’t get his description in the Roza chapters either. As we learn more of each character, the story begins to come together, bringing each character’s ability forward in order to free Roza.This novel has a lot to say about what we see in a person--the outside looks or the person. There’s an amusing recurring analogy of writing essays for college that adds another layer of meaning. These topics are mature, so I see this novel as being more interesting to mature 8th graders. The characters are about to attend college, so their lives are vastly different from middle school lives. Stick to the novel--don’t stop at the slow beginning. Everything is important to the story and lead to the ending, which comes full circle back to the people of Bone Gap.
    • 4/5
      Bone Gap, Illinois is a little different than most places. No geological feature produced the name of the town. Instead other gaps exist. Finn and Sean O'Sullivan live there. Sean always dreamed of going to medical school, but his plans were thwarted when his mother ran off with a man. He did the responsible thing, got a job driving the ambulance and taking care of his adolescent brother. Finn finds a Polish woman named Roza in their barn. They know she's running from something but aren't sure what. When she goes missing, Finn is the only one to have witnessed what appeared to be a kidnapping by a man in a black SUV. But was it a kidnapping or did she go willingly? Finn is unable to describe then man he saw take her. Life isn't the same after Roza is gone. The townspeople always thought Finn a little odd, and now they find him even odder. No one really believes him. Finn befriends Petey, a girl who hates her given name of Priscilla. At times the two of them get a glimpse of a place neither had ever known to be near Bone Gap. Will Finn or Sean find Roza or will they just give up? The reader also gets Roza's story and is kept abreast of what is happening to her while she is in the "gap." This book is described as magical realism. It combines reality with fantasy. It makes for an odd but compelling novel. The audience is definitely teens, but adults will enjoy it as well. I listened to the Harper Audio version offered this summer through AudioSync. This is not my usual genre. Although I found the book strange, I was compelled to keep listening.
    • 4/5
      Tells the story of two brothers and the woman who came in to their lives, Roza, and just as quickly was taken when she was kidnapped. Finn couldn't describe the kidnapper except for the way he moves. A beautiful story, part mythology, part magic, part realistic fiction. Using a narrator and alternating focus on Roza and Finn, the story unfolds as Finn falls in love with Petey, he gets pets who show up and connect with him, and he figures out where Roza has been taken. Roza is trapped by a strange, icy man who wants her to love him. Complicated, lovely, and strange.
    • 4/5
      I have to admit that when I picked up this book I paid more attention to the stickers for the Prinze Award and the National Book Finalist Award than to the blurb identifying it as magical realism. (It has won a number of other awards as well.) If I had seen that description, I might have passed over the book, so I’m glad I didn’t; this is a wonderful story.There aren’t many characters. Finn O’Sullivan, 17, lives alone with his older brother Sean in Bone Gap, Illinois, a small rural town where everyone knows everyone else. It’s also “a magical place. . . the bones of the world were a little looser here, double-jointed, twisting back on themselves, leaving spaces one could slip into and hide. . . . Not gaps made of rocks or mountains. We have gaps in the world."One could also say that these “gaps” are just different ways of explaining reality.A little less than a year before the story begins, the brothers find a beautiful Polish runaway in their barn named Roza. They offer her a room in the empty apartment adjoining their house, and Sean falls in love with Roza. But then Roza vanishes. Finn claims he saw a man take Roza away, but is unable to provide a description. No one believes Finn; they think he is just scatterbrained and made up the story.Indeed, one common theme is the way in which presumptions and prejudices color people’s views so much, that they cannot see one another. We are apt to make quick judgments and assign labels that become hard to shake. As T.S. Eliot wrote in “The Love Song of J. Alfred Prufrock”:"And I have known the eyes already, known them all—The eyes that fix you in a formulated phrase,And when I am formulated, sprawling on a pin,When I am pinned and wriggling on the wall,Then how should I beginTo spit out all the butt-ends of my days and ways?"People in love also have different ways of seeing one another. At one point, Finn tells his girlfriend Petey he loves her:“She shook her head. ‘You can see me, that's all.’But wasn't that love? Seeing what no one else could?”By implication, love means not only really seeing each other, but still choosing the other person “anyway,” and moreover, learning to cherish what we see.This first love that Finn and Petey share is depicted in part through magical realism. One is reminded of the paintings in which Chagall shows how he feels through his art. In these famous paintings, he and his wife-to-be Bella are usually flying: swept off their feet and soaring above the earth, just as one does feel when one finally experiences the highs and happiness of passion.Similarly, Roza’s abduction is depicted as what Hell might seem like - the world, now cruel, is turned upside down, and there is no escape.A third way magical realism is employed is in the use of Bone Gap itself. This is an actual place, and included among the first settlers were the five Rude brothers. In this story, there are also five brothers with the surname of Rude. I believe this adds to the tone of the story as being both in time and out of time.At bottom though, it is a coming of age story, and a riveting one. It is also, even more appealingly, a story of what it means to love someone. As Finn says to Petey in a poem (also referencing his cat which had gone missing):“…you find a girl, you kissa girl, you find the cat,you hopethat there is nothing left to lose, andall there is, is there to find.”Evaluation: The awards for this book are well-deserved. Once you accept the magical realism as a perceptual framework, much like the role of Death in The Book Thief by Markus Zusak, you can adapt your expectations, and become a collaborator in deriving meaning from the story. Like poetry, the magical elements add an imagery to the words, generating meaning richer than could be imparted by ordinary prose.
    • 5/5
      Finn has always been considered a little strange, and now that Roza has disappeared, his small town of Bone Gap holds him responsible. Finn alleges that she was kidnapped, but he cannot offer up a useful description of the abductor. Roza had appeared under mysterious circumstances a year before, and was taken in by Finn and his older brother, Sean, who subsequently developed a crush on her—and now wonders if perhaps her departure was a voluntary rejection of him. But Roza has been taken by a dangerous stranger and imprisoned in a series of bizarre supernatural dwellings from which she cannot escape—unless she agrees to marry the kidnapper. As Finn tries to puzzle out how to find Roza, he develops his own romantic interest in the strongly independent Priscilla (Petey, for short), despite what the town may think.
    • 4/5
      An innovative story that contains both reality and fantasy. I loved the characters and fell in love with Roza as well as Sean and Finn. It took me a while to figure out that this was magical realism, but once I did, I couldn't put the story down. I loved the addition of the disability of non-facial recognition because it show the aspects of recognition that pull out personality traits.
    • 4/5
      Finn and Petey, Finn and Sean, Finn and the Rudes, Finn and the town, Roza and everybody. This is the story of Roza's disappearance, and the impact on the main characters as well as the whole community. Told from the points of view of Finn, Petey, Roza, and Sean, but mostly Finn, the novel describes the loss of important people in Finn's life, most recently Roza. A mystery, a coming of age tale, a romance, and a surreal fairy tale, this is a beautifully written and engaging young adult book.
    • 5/5
      Finn O'Sullivan lives a hard scrapple life with his brother, Sean in rural Illinois. Their father is dead and their mother left them years ago. Life improves when a strange runaway, Rosa, appears. Just as suddenly, however, Rosa is kidnapped. Only Finn witnesses the abduction and he cannot describe the man who took her. Finn, himself implicated in her disappearance, sets out to find Rosa. What he doesn't know --or won't admit to himself-- is that he suffers from face blindness (Prosopagnosia): an inability to recognize and remember faces. How will he ever recover Rosa? This is a wondrous book: beautifully written, magical touches (Rosa's journey is mystical) and poignant. Parts mystery, suspense, romance and fable: it all adds up to a great read. Highly recommended.
    • 4/5
      This is a magical story about knowing who we are and being able to see the truth about others. It's a good read.
    • 4/5
      BONE GAP is on all the recommended YA lists, so I picked it up despite the cover (hate bees and wasps). I was pleasantly surprised. If you are looking for straightforward plot and answers, this is not the book for you. One of the main characters witnesses a kidnapping of Roza; it is never clearly answered who took Roza and where. There is an otherworldly ether that floats through the narrative. Read it for the small town antics and beekeeping factoids alone, if not for the beautiful prose.
    • 4/5
      Very well-written story. It asks "What is the nature of beauty?" through the lens of one main character, Finn, who has a neurological disorder, prosopagnosia, which makes him unable to recognize faces. It also asks this question through the story of a beautiful Polish stranger, Roza, who mysteriously appears one day and is just as mysteriously taken away to a magical place. I don't think it needed the device of magical realism to make it a good story. For me, it seemed to take away from the author's message. Maybe I'm just too literal to enjoy fantasy being inserted into an otherwise realistic fiction.
    • 5/5
      This book is currently an Andre Norton Award finalist, and I read it as part of my Nebula packet.Bone Gap is a wonderful example American magical realism. It works in all the small-town eccentricities you expect and blends that with the nasty misogynist element found in so many fairy tales worldwide--all toward an outcome that conveys a beautiful, hopeful feminist message. I adored this book, and even ended up a little sniffly at the end.
    • 4/5
      Marvelous story of two brothers, Finn and Sean. Eighteen-year old Finn lives with his brother who works as an EMT and has put his plans of medical school on hold until Finn is finished with high school. A young Polish woman mysteriously shows up in their barn and slowly trusts the brothers as they welcome her into their house and tend to her. Just as mysteriously, she is abducted and Finn, who witnessed the snatch, cannot identify the abductor because he cannot recognize faces.Who or what is the person that abducted Roza is unclear. He gives her everything she could possibly need and everyday asks if she loves him yet. Finn works hard to find her and rescue her for Sean who thinks Roza abandoned him just like their mother did.This was a beautifully written story full of imagery and mysticism. A big question theme through the story is what is beauty and it is treated with sensitivity and compassion.
    • 5/5
      A beautiful Polish girl shows up one day in Sean and Finn's barn, hurt and frightened. 17 year old Finn takes her to his older brother, strong, silent Sean who matter-of-factly takes care of her injuries and offers her food. Roza decides to stay on with the brothers as she is in a country far from home and has escaped from a kidnapper, intent on keeping her and all of her beauty for himself.The 3 bond together and the brothers enjoy the warmth Roza brings to their broken family with her knowledge of growing fresh vegetables and making good foods. Finn discovers a magic horse in the barn one day and starts riding it with Petey, an outcast because of her unusual looks. Finn doesn't care what she looks like though; in fact he is bullied because he never can remember faces anyhow. But he does know he is comfortable with her, as Sean and Roza develop a strong sense of comfort with each other on their own. One day, the 3 decide to venture forth to the town fair and all good things come to a screeching halt. Roza is spotted by her former kidnapper and taken again, with only Finn as a witness. She seems to be going willingly with the man, but as she gets in the car, Finn realizes too late that she was forced to do so in order to save him. With Finn's inability to describe the man, the people of Bone Gap think it is all a story and why would Roza stay with the boys when even their own mother wouldn't ? But this story isn't simple and although Roza has slipped into a gap not exactly real, all hope is not given up. This twisted fairy tale story brings out questions about beauty in our society, how things and people aren't always what they seem and what true bravery is. This 2016 Printz winner is for ages 14 and up for incidental sex, but more for the brutality of the world.