Quintessence by Jess Redman

Synopsis:

“Find the Elements. Grow the Light. Save the Starling.

Three months ago, twelve-year-old Alma moved to the town of Four Points. Her panic attacks started a week later, and they haven’t stopped—even though she’s told her parents that they have. She’s homesick and friendless and every day she feels less and less like herself.

But one day she finds a telescope in the town’s junk shop, and through its lens, she watches a star—a star that looks like a child—fall from the sky and into her backyard. Alma knows what it’s like to be lost and afraid, to long for home, and she knows that it’s up to her to save the star. And so, with the help of some unlikely new friends from Astronomy Club, she sets out on a quest that will take a little bit of science, a little bit of magic, and her whole self.”

Review

The combination of realistic fiction and fantasy are brought together effortlessly in this story of a young girl searching for her true self. Alma’s life was upended. Her older brother moved away to college and her parents moved her to a new town. Soon after she started having panic attacks and lost her “Alma-ness.” In Alma’s attempt to not disappoint her parents, she decides to sign up for an astronomy club. Little does she know that there are other forces at work. And it will be up to her to help save someone or something that is as alone as she is.

Jess Redman expertly combines what it feels like to already feel a little out of sorts while growing up with something as big as panic attacks in a way that is very real. Alma doesn’t want to disappoint her parents and has tried everything they’ve suggested. But, she’s having panic attacks almost daily. As an adult reading, a book meant for kids, I wanted the parents to see that Alma isn’t alright and needs help. But from a child’s perspective, I can easily see how Alma wanted to hide the issue.

Throughout Alma’s adventure to save this other being she learns that true friends will stick by you, that everyone has something going on beyond what you know about them, and that helping someone else makes you often feel good.

Additional Thoughts

Needing help and asking for help doesn’t make you a weak person. It makes you a strong person by realizing that help can make you even stronger. Finding your truth is often about learning more about who you are as a person in the wider world. And sometimes, there is magic in the world, if you just look up!

Need to Know:

Title: Quintessence
Author: Jess Redman
Publisher: Farrar, Straus and Giroux Books for Young Readers
Publication Date: July 28, 2020
Page Number: 384 pgs.