Author: Jamie McGuireRelease Date: May 29, 2018
The first time Elliott Youngblood spots Catherine Calhoun, he’s just a boy with a camera, and he’s never seen a sadder and more beautiful sight. Both Elliott and Catherine feel like outcasts, yet they find an easy friendship with each other. But when Catherine needs him most, Elliott is forced to leave town.
Elliott finally returns, but he and Catherine are now different people. He’s a star high school athlete, and she spends all her free time working at her mother’s mysterious bed-and-breakfast. Catherine hasn’t forgiven Elliott for abandoning her, but he’s determined to win back her friendship…and her heart.
Just when Catherine is ready to fully trust Elliott, he becomes the prime suspect in a local tragedy. Despite the town’s growing suspicions, Catherine clings to her love for Elliott. But a devastating secret that Catherine has buried could destroy whatever chance of happiness they have left.
Enjoy this message from Elliot and an excerpt from the book!
Message from Elliott
My name is Elliott. You don’t know my story yet, but you
will. I spent my summers with my aunt and uncle just down the street from
Catherine. She lives in a looming, rickety bed and breakfast called the
Juniper, and spends most of her time outside, away from the memories that live
between the Juniper’s walls amidst more tangible dangers that I never knew
existed until now.
It’s not so much that I fell in love or even that I
fought for it, but that a war is waging inside Catherine’s home—one I can’t
fight for her. It doesn’t matter how strong I am, or how determined I am to
stay. I can only get close enough to observe her pain in detail. And, so I
stay, and wait, and help her the only way I know how; to do what I couldn’t for
her before.
I hope you’ll understand.
Excerpt: All the Little Lights by Jamie McGuire
Elliott began to speak, but a small group of girls
approached our table.
“Aw,” Presley said, dramatically touching her chest.
“Catherine got herself a boyfriend. I feel so bad that all this time we thought
you were lying about him being from out of town.”
Three carbon copies of Presley—Tara and Tatum Martin
and Brie Burns—all giggled and tossed their bleached-blonde tresses. Tara and
Tatum were identical twins, but they all strived to look like Presley.
“Maybe just outside of town,” Brie said. “Like a
reservation, maybe?”
“Oklahoma doesn’t have reservations,” I said, appalled
by her stupidity.
“Yeah, they do,” Brie argued.
“You’re thinking of tribal land,” Elliott said,
unfazed.
“I’m Presley,” she said to Elliott, smug.
I looked away, not wanting to witness their
introduction, but Elliott didn’t move or speak, so I turned to see what was
holding up their exchange. Elliott offered me a small grin, ignoring Presley’s
outstretched hand.
She made a face and crossed her arms. “Is Brie right?
Do you live in White Eagle?”
Elliott raised an eyebrow. “That’s the headquarters
for the Ponca tribe.”
“And?” Presley sniped.
Elliott sighed, seeming bored. “I’m Cherokee.”
“So that’s an Indian, right? Isn’t White Eagle for
Indians?” she asked.
“Just go away, Presley,” I pleaded, worried she would
say something even more offensive.
Excitement sparked in Presley’s eyes. “Wow, Kit-Cat.
Are we getting a little big for our britches?”
I looked up at her, anger blazing in my eyes. “It’s
Catherine.”
Presley led them to a booth across the room,
continuing to tease Elliott and me from afar.
“I’m so sorry,” I whispered. “They’re just doing it
because you’re with me.”
“Because I’m with you?”
“They hate me,” I grumbled.
He turned his spoon upside down and stuck it in his
mouth, seeming unaffected. “It’s not hard to see why.”
I wondered what about my outward appearance made it so
obvious. Maybe that’s why the town hadn’t stopped blaming Mama and me for
my grandparents’ mistakes. Maybe I looked like someone they should hate.
“Why do you look embarrassed?” he asked.
“I guess I was hoping you didn’t know about my family
and the smelter.”
“Oh. That. My aunt told me years ago. Is that what you
think? That they’re mean to you because of your family history with the
town?”
“Why else?”
“Catherine.” My name sounded like a soft laugh
tumbling from his mouth. “They’re jealous of you.”
I frowned and shook my head. “What could they possibly
be jealous of me for? We barely have two pennies to rub together.”
“Have you seen yourself?” he asked.
I blushed and looked down. Only Dad had ever
complimented my looks.
“You’re all the things they’re not.”
I crossed my arms on the table and watched the warm
hue of the corner streetlight blink between the branches of a tree. It was a
strange feeling, wanting to hear more and hoping he’d talk about anything else.
“What they said doesn’t bother you?” I asked, surprised.
“It use to.”
“Now it doesn’t?”
“My uncle John says people can only make us angry if
we let them, and if we let them, we give them power.”
“That’s pretty profound.”
“I listen to him sometimes, even though he thinks I
don’t.”
“What else does he say?” He didn’t hesitate. “That you
either get good at rising above and meeting ignorance with education, or you
get really good at being bitter.”
I smiled. Elliott spoke his uncle’s words with
respect.
“So you just choose not to let what people say get to
you?”
“Pretty much.”
“How?” I said, leaning in. I was genuinely
curious, hoping he would unveil some magical secret that would end the misery
Presley and her friends loved invoking in me.
“Oh, I get angry. It gets old when people feel the
need to tell me their great-grandmother was a Cherokee princess, or that stupid
joke about if I got my name from the first thing my parents saw after they
walked out of a teepee. I can get heated when someone calls me chief, when I
see people in headdresses outside of our ceremonies. But my uncle says we
should either be compassionate and educate or leave them alone in their
ignorance. Besides, there’s too much ignorance in the world to let it all get
to me. If I did, all I’d ever feel is anger, and I don’t want to be like my
mom.”
“Is that why you were punching our tree?”
He looked down, either unwilling or unable to answer
the question.
“A lot bothers me,” I grumbled, sitting back. I
glanced at the clones, dressed in cutoff denim shorts and floral blouses, just
variations of the same shirt from the same store.
Dad tried to make sure I had the right clothes and the
right backpack, but year after year Mama watched as more of my childhood
friends faded away. She began to wonder what we’d done wrong, and then I began
to wonder, too.
The truth was, I hated Presley for hating me. I didn’t
have the heart to tell Mama that I would never fit in. I wasn’t vile enough for
those small-town, small-minded girls. It took me a long time to figure out that
I didn’t really want to, but at fifteen, I sometimes wondered if it was better
than being alone. Dad couldn’t be my best friend forever. I took a bite of my
sherbet.
“Stop,” Elliott said.
“Stop what?” I asked, the cool orangey-goodness
melting on my tongue.
“Looking at them like you wish you were sitting over
there. You’re better than that.”
“We should probably, um . . . we should
go.”
Elliott stood, waiting for me to slide out of the
booth. He followed me out, so I wasn’t sure if he noticed Presley and the
clones covering their insults and giggles with their hands.
When he stopped next to the trash can behind their
booth, I knew he had. “What are you laughing at?” he asked.
I tugged on his T-shirt, begging him with my eyes to
keep walking.
Presley rolled her shoulders and lifted her chin,
thrilled to be acknowledged. “Just how cute is Kit-Cat with her new boyfriend?
It’s precious how you don’t want to hurt her feelings. I mean . . . I
have to assume that’s what”—she gestured to us—“this is.”
Elliott walked over to their table, and the girls’
giggles quieted. He knocked on the wood and sighed. “You know why you’ll never
outgrow the need to make others feel like shit so you can feel better,
Presley?”
She narrowed her eyes at him, watching him like a snake
ready to strike.
Elliott continued, “Because it’s a temporary high. It
never lasts, and you’ll never stop because it’s the only happiness you’ll ever
have in your sad, pathetic life that revolves around manicures and highlighting
your hair. Your friends? They don’t like you. No one ever will because you
don’t like yourself. So every time you give Catherine a hard time, she’ll know.
She’ll know why you’re doing it, just like your friends will know. Just
like you’ll know that you’re overcompensating. Every time you
throw insults Catherine’s way, it’s that much less of a secret.” He made eye
contact with each clone and then Presley. “Have the day you deserve.”
He returned to the door and held it open, gesturing for me
to walk through. We navigated the parked cars until we were on the other side
of the lot, and headed back toward our neighborhood. The streetlamps were on,
the gnats and mosquitoes buzzing beneath the bright bulbs. The quiet made the
sounds of our shoes against the pavement more prominent.
“That was,” I began, searching for the right word,
“legendary. I could never tell someone off like that.”
“Well, I don’t live here, so that makes it easier. And that
wasn’t entirely mine.”
“What do you mean?” “It’s from a scene in Detention
Club Musical. Don’t tell me you didn’t watch it when you
were little.”
I stared at him in disbelief, and then laughter erupted from
my throat. “The movie that came out when we were eight?”
“I watched it every day for like a year and a half.”
I giggled. “Wow. I can’t believe I didn’t catch it.”
“I’m just glad Presley didn’t. That would have made my
monologue much less intimidating.”
About the author:
Jamie McGuire is the #1 New York Times, USA Today, and Wall Street Journal bestselling author of Walking Disaster, the Maddox Brothers series, the Providence trilogy, and the international bestseller Beautiful Disaster, which paved the way for the new-adult genre. She was the first independent author in history to strike a print deal with retail giant Walmart, and her work has been translated into fifty languages. She lives in Steamboat Springs, Colorado, with her husband, Jeff, and their three children. To learn more about Jamie, visit www.jamiemcguire.com, or follow her on Twitter @JamieMcGuire.
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