Backward Glass

September 23, 2013
A dead baby and a decades-old list bearing Kenny Maxwell’s name and birthday impel the 14-year-old on a quest through time that teaches him about sacrifice and justice. Luka, a girl living in 1987, visits Kenny in 1977 to explain how he can travel backward and forward in time via a mirror in his new home. The novel’s quest theme involves standard elements of initiation (Kenny’s initial ignorance about time travel) and purity of purpose (the travelers attempt to prevent the death of the infant), but the inclusion of a dialect-spouting Scotsman from the 17th-century and the inanely named Prince Harming provide a knockabout adult presence. Although the somewhat arbitrary rules of time travel (e.g., “From an even-numbered decade, you can go back on even-numbered days”) complicate the narrative, debut novelist Lomax handles the plot’s complexities with skill as the story builds toward a satisfying resolution that offers the hope of redemption and the promise that, while much of life is beyond one’s control, it’s still possible to influence one’s destiny. Ages 12–up. Agent: Katie Grimm, Don Congdon Associates.

Starred review from September 15, 2013
Intricate, lusciously creepy paranormal mystery. It's 1977, and 15-year-old Kenny Maxwell has just moved into the weird old Hollerith place. While helping his dad renovate the carriage house, Kenny finds a dead, mummified baby in the wall. And right there with the baby, he finds something even creepier: a list of years, names and birthdates starting in 1917 and going through 2017. Right there, labeled "1977," it lists Kenny's own name and birthdate. It's not long before Kenny starts meeting the other names on the list, as the carriage house (now an inexpertly blocked-off crime scene) also hosts a magic mirror that empowers one kid in every generation with the ability to go backward or forward a decade. Luka is only 7 in Kenny's time, but she is 16 when he meets her through the mirror, and when she brings him forward to her own time and shows him Nintendo, it's a revelation. As Kenny starts to figure out the time-travel rules (aided both by his fellow travelers and by notes he leaves himself from the future), he becomes convinced he can save that mummified baby. Readers sadly accustomed to slapdash plotting may well be forgiven for their shock that all the plot threads come together, brilliantly. Following the complex threads of adventure as they come together through the multitude of intertwined journeys is a joy. (Paranormal mystery. 13-15)

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October 15, 2013
Grades 7-10 In 1977, 15-year-old Kenny is helping his father renovate an old carriage house when they find, hidden in a wall, a dead infant wrapped in a newspaper from decades ago and accompanied by a note written to Kenny, pleading with him to prevent the baby's death. But how? Soon Kenny discovers his ability to move one decade forward and back in time through an antique mirror. This magical object and an urban legend frame Lomax's time-travel murder mystery, though the best features are the characters, one each decade, who respond to being selected as a mirror kid, each in his or her own way. The kids' relationships, foisted upon them, are complicated by their different places in time. The complex plotting, directed by clearly defined rules of time travel, unfolds carefully and with great suspense and danger as Kenny struggles to make things right, despite the understanding that he meddles with history at great personal risk. This debut novel will leave readers eager for more, and the ending hints that they might get it.(Reprinted with permission of Booklist, copyright 2013, American Library Association.)