The Steep and Thorny Way

by Cat Winters

Overview

A thrilling reimagining of Shakespeare’s Hamlet, The Steep and Thorny Way tells the story of a murder most foul and the mighty power of love and acceptance in a state gone terribly rotten.

1920s Oregon is not a welcoming place for Hanalee Denney, the daughter of a white woman and an African-American man. She has almost no rights by law, and the Ku Klux Klan breeds fear and hatred in even Hanalee’s oldest friendships. Plus, her father, Hank Denney, died a year ago, hit by a drunk-driving teenager. Now her father’s killer is out of jail and back in town, and he claims that Hanalee’s father wasn’t killed by the accident at all but, instead, was poisoned by the doctor who looked after him—who happens to be Hanalee’s new stepfather.

The only way for Hanalee to get the answers she needs is to ask Hank himself, a “haint” wandering the roads at night.

Product Details

ISBN-13:	9781419719158
Publisher:	Amulet Books
Publication date:	03/08/2016
Pages:	352
Product dimensions:	8.50(w) x 5.90(h) x 1.30(d)
Lexile:	880L (what's this?)
Age Range:	13 - 18 Years

About the Author

Cat Winters is the author of The Cure for Dreaming and In the Shadow of Blackbirds, which collected three starred reviews and was a finalist for the William C. Morris Award for debut YA fiction. She lives in Portland, Oregon. www.catwinters.com.

Editorial Reviews

**STARRED REVIEW**
" A powerful, gripping, and exceptionally well-executed glimpse into a little-known corner of U.S. history."

Booklist

This is genre-pushing historical fiction that will surprise and enlighten readers.

Horn Book Magazine

History, mystery…for To Kill A Mockingbird fans.

Justine Magazine

**STARRED REVIEW**
" A powerful, gripping, and exceptionally well-executed glimpse into a little-known corner of U.S. history."

Booklist

★ 01/01/2016
Gr 8 Up—There's something rotten in 1920s Oregon in this Hamlet-inspired tale of a biracial girl seeking the truth about her African American father's death. When the drunk driver who killed her father is released, Hanalee starts to look more closely at her small town and the folks who live there. She uncovers prejudice, injustice, and serious crimes from some very unexpected sources. This is not humdrum historical fiction as usual. Hanalee is a fantastic lead, armed with a two-barreled pistol and led by the lost soul of her father. Her gumption is inspiring—nothing she is faced with is too scary to make her back down, but her stubbornness doesn't prevent her from evolving her point of view. Setting Hanalee in the backdrop of Prohibition-era Oregon, punched up with bootleggers, a hidden gay relationship, the public and private face of the Ku Klux Klan, and a dash of the supernatural makes for a delightfully unpredictable page-turner. VERDICT Unique and riveting historical fiction that feels anything but dated.—Emily Moore, Camden County Library System, NJ

School Library Journal

★ 2015-12-08
A biracial teen seeks justice for her murdered father in Prohibition-era Oregon The daughter of a white woman and an African-American man whose marriage was not recognized by the law, 16-year-old Hanalee has few legal rights during the 1920s, an era of extreme intolerance exacerbated by the ever present specter of racial violence from the Ku Klux Klan. Hanalee's father, "the last full-blooded Negro in Elston, Oregon," was struck and killed by a drunk-driving teenager a year earlier. When the teen is released from prison, he tells Hanalee that the doctor who tended to her father the night of the accident is the real killer—the doctor who just happens to be Hanalee's new stepfather. With clear parallels to Hamlet, Hanalee struggles to uncover the truth about her father's death, hoping the truth will protect her and those she loves and put her father's wandering soul to rest. A fast-paced read with multiple twists, the novel delivers a history lesson wrapped inside a murder mystery and ghost story. Winters deftly captures the many injustices faced by marginalized people in the years following World War I as well as a glimmer of hope for the better America to come. A riveting story of survival, determination, love, and friendship. (Historical mystery. 14-18)

Kirkus Reviews