RELEASE DAY REVIEW: Dancing in the Moonlight – Hermione Lee

Amazon Link: amazon

Teenage ballroom dancer Skye Lancaster struggles to gain acceptance and popularity among her peers, only to encounter a series of challenges and dilemmas that reveal who her only ally is. As she attempts to mend her relationship with her ex-boyfriend and dance partner Finn Evans, she realizes what she had been pursuing all along was never what she truly wanted or needed. A tragedy strikes, and Skye is forced to come to terms with the fragility and unpredictability of life. In the end, she must gather the broken pieces of what she used to be, redefine the purpose of her life, and start anew before she loses herself forever.

Skye Lancaster and Finn Evans have been dancing together since they were seven and now ten years later, they compete in international competitions. Best friends that are now boyfriend and girlfriend with a strong love and bond.

Suddenly, Skye has lost her passion for dance and is consumed with the idea of being one of the popular students. As hard as she tries, she can’t seem to break through the thick wall separating her from the in crowd until she overhears a conversation about catching bugs and scaring the new substitute teacher.

When no one is willing to catch the bugs Skye volunteers to do it. The bugs scare the teacher, and Skye is welcomed into the group. When Finn finds out he is surprised and disturbed that the girl he loves could hurt someone else. Skye realizes that Finn is pulling away, but she doesn’t want to lose her new friends even though she herself is upset at what they have done.

The girls take Skye under their wings, dressing her, using makeup and making her one of their own. Though Skye loves Finn she does not do anything to change her position with the popular students even when they advise her to break up with Finn since he is not good enough for her.

When her new friends torment Finn she does not step in to stop it for fear of being alienated from the group she so desperately wanted to be a part of. Her actions have led to their dancing not being what it used to be, in fact their last competition they lost. Skye doesn’t know how to make things better and is sure she has lost the one person she could always count on to be there for her, Finn, the one she loves.

When an exchange student from France is introduced to the students, they find themselves with a new victim of their abuse. Skye writes a letter to her stating that one of the guys loves her and she should seek him out. When she does, she is humiliated when he tells her it wasn’t him and she is the last person he would be with. Devastated, the girl keeps to herself while the group laugh at her.

That action was the straw that broke the camel’s back, and Finn can no longer turn a blind eye to what she does. They stop dancing since they can’t even look each other in the eye, something the judges would immediately pick up on.

This book focuses on bullying and the harm that it causes. A teacher who finally gives up and quits and an exchange student who is broken hearted. Bullying is not something new, it goes on all the time in schools all over the country, popular kids who think it is fun to torment other students for no other reason than it is fun.