Skip to main content

Flutter


At seventeen, Emery Land finds her life voraciously consumed by physical deterioration resulting from seizures.  Practically living in a hospital under constant surveillance by her scientist father and an ostensibly-skeptical team of doctors, she feels herself a lab rat; consequently, weighing the stifling emotional price of her caged existence against the physically lethal cost of freedom, Emery flees in order to pursue her theory that during her seizures she travels through time and space.  Inhabiting an emotional purgatory that exists somewhere between the heaven of free will and the hell of self-recriminations, she meets Asher Clarke who seems to be intimately entwined with her plight.  Together, they must race against the Doomsday clock to understand the truth of their complicated connection. Above all else, Flutter is a beautifully-written, poignant tale of possibly-star-crossed lovers that questionably ends in death but certainly avoids being trite or predictable.  Moreover, it would be a wonderful read for those who are intrigued by aspects of science-fiction or paranormal fiction but are hesitant to explore these interests. As the plot unfolds, the protagonist becomes increasingly mired in a hopelessly, complex situation.  Being drawn further and further away from a satisfying conclusion, the story necessitates a deus ex machina akin to Austen’s poultry rustlers in order to avoid sending the audience into a nihilistic plummet.  Nevertheless, the very device which saves both the plot and the reader is simultaneously cathartic and unsettling.  Linko’s expert manipulation of first-person point of view encourages the reader to not only fall prey to the limitations of her naïve narrator but also deny the wisdom of a more balanced, objective perspective – willfully experiencing this sensuous journey as Emery does.  In the end, finding herself returned to an existence outside of Linko’s story, the reader feels compelled to question beliefs and portrayals of an afterlife.  Although critics may argue that the author’s conceptualization is highly discriminatory – excluding nonwhite, non-christian individuals – Linko’s crafting of such an intimate bond between the protagonist’s life and her afterlife suggests that “heaven” is deeply personal and thereby reflects the plurality of the living.  In short, Linko seems to dispel the notion of an objective reality and propose that each of us is only privy to the heaven which reflects us.

  • Flutter by Gina Linko
  • Secondary
  • Random House
  • 343 pp.
  • Published 2012
  • ISBN 978-0-375-86996-9
  • $16.99
  • Romance

Comments

Popular posts from this blog

Becoming a Comics Librarian and the Importance of Joining a Community of Practice

  Originally published April 5, 2023 Library Developments Blog |  Library Development and Networking Division Texas State Library and Archives Commission ***** As a freshly-minted librarian, I was hired to serve at THE high school bearing my district’s name alongside an amazingly zany, veteran librarian who knew the current collection inside and out as she’d been the one to revitalize it with bond money just prior to my arrival. To say that I was intimidated about what I could possibly have to contribute is more than an understatement. So when the moment of truth arrived and I was handed a “small” purchase order to get my feet wet, I. Was. Stymied! Her  fingerprints were all throughout that collection, and what  she  didn’t read our assistant  did . How would I ever fit into this team?! What could I possibly contribute?! To be honest… after teaching a core, tested subject for fifteen years, I was just beginning to read young adult literature regularly...

ARSL 2024 Conference Recap

  Originally published October 25, 2024 Library Developments Blog  |  Library Development and Networking Division Texas State Library and Archives Commission Waiting outside Gate 21 where the scent of pizza from the nearby Eastside Pies booth filled the air, I excitedly chatted about the transitional weather with my new teammate – to quote James Hurst “summer was dead but autumn had not yet been born” – the logistics of traveling for work, and our preparedness to attend the 2024 Association for Small and Rural Libraries (ARSL) conference . Neither of us truly knew what to expect, but we had been told that ARSL is THE conference for rural and small libraries, with conference organizers who not only understand the constraints of these libraries but also the unique opportunities for their being chrysalises of change. The conference theme “Libraries are (r)Evolutionary” proclaimed the event aimed to provide an opportunity for exploring the transformative power of rural and sm...

Staff Highlight: Christina Taylor

Originally published July 28, 2021 Library Developments Blog | Library Development and Networking Division Texas State Library and Archives Commission **** As part of our effort to make sure you know who the staff here at the Texas State Library are, we would like to periodically highlight staff members that you may at some point come in contact with! For our next staff highlight of 2021, I interviewed Christina Taylor, Library Development and Networking (LDN)’s new Youth Services Consultant on the Continuing Education and Consulting (CEC) team)! What are your job responsibilities at TSLAC? As the Youth Services Consultant, I will work towards ensuring Texas libraries are knowledgeable about and have the resources to implement youth services that meet the needs of their communities. To that end, I will lead projects for internal, statewide, and national initiatives relating to youth services. What projects are you excited to get started with? As a fervent advocate for comics and graph...