“This isn’t any old first day of school.”

From Amy Reed’s The Boy and Girl Who Broke the World.

Billy is starting senior year at Fog Harbor High School in his hometown of Rome, Washington, but this year is going to be unlike any other because Rome is combining with their longtime, neighboring rival Carthage because of budget cuts and student sizes.  One of those new students is Lydia from Carthage where it’s just been her and her dad (Larry) since he mom died while abandoning them ten years ago.  Raised by his grandmother because his mother died long ago from a drug overdose, Billy knows nothing but near-poverty and his grandmother’s rough and vindictive parenting techniques… which only got worse when Billy’s estranged uncle (Caleb) left to find success in a band.  Somehow Billy and Lydia become friends even though they are polar opposites; drawn to each other with Billy’s optimism a change of pace to Lydia’s refusal to ever need anything from anyone. As the two get closer, more unexplainably odd things begin to happen, such as a denser-than-normal fog and a tornado, but the two also experience strange things that they are unwilling to share.  Lydia also begins to see a little “ghost” version of herself as a child, while Billy is convinced that his decrepit old house is trying to kill him.  However when Caleb storms/disappears offstage at a concert, and Billy and Lydia find him hiding in Billy’s attic, the real test of their friendship begins

Reed’s introductions are slow, but the story does pick up fairly quickly.  While the two main characters are initially endearing, they both change through emotional/mental stress, and it’s too much for their initial likability to keep up with drastic changes.  The author’s thinly-veiled political commentary will either infuriate or distract from the story, depending on political view.  The Boy and Girl Who Broke the World is odd; set in our world, but also not by an overuse of oddities, makes for a slightly-confusing read.