Wooding, Chris. Crashing.

WOODING, Chris. Crashing. Scholastic, PUSH. 142p. c1998. 0-439-09012-1. $6.99. S Jay is a typical teenager--his parents go on a trip and he decides to throw a party to celebrate the beginning of the summer. Who can blame him? He has had his eye on Jo in his English class for a while. This might just be his chance to really talk to her, and it will be fun to drink a little and blow off some steam on the warm summer night. It will also be an opportunity for their gang to be together one last time before they head their separate ways for the summer. The night, however, falls apart, when one of the girlfriends brings a friend who just broke up with her boorish boyfriend Stew. He then makes an invited appearance at the party, starting a brawl between the two groups of friends, culminating in broken windows, a destroyed house and many, many bruises on all sides.

This first novel by a young British author captures the essence of being a high school boy, yearning for a first love, and wanting to impress your friends. The language is British, though I believe accessible to US readers. It's a pretty dark book, with violence, drinking, adolescent angst and perhaps even a less than ideal (from an adult perspective, at least) ending, but I think it will make sense to and resonate with readers who enjoy writers such as Chris Lynch and Walter Dean Myers. Sarah Applegate, Libn., River Ridge H.S., Lacey, WA