YA author Sarah Tregay sets the first half of her book Love and Leftovers: A Novel in Verse in New Hampshire, specifically Durham and Oyster River High School. The setting alone will draw NH teens to the book, but the novel also has much to keep readers-albeit female readers–interested. Written as a series of short poems, the book explores a turbulent year in the life of a teenage girl. After Marcie’s father leaves her mother for a young male bartender, Marcie and her mother move from their home in Idaho to a family camp in Durham, NH, and Marcie enrolls in Oyster River High School. The book explores Marcie’s confused feelings about old and new relationships, her mother’s mental state, and her struggle to fit in somewhere. The poetry works well to capture the emotions, and the book looks frankly at issues of sex, love and depression.
Programming Database for NH Public Librarians