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Shooting Monarchs
By John Halliday
Margaret K. McElderry Books
Reviewed by: Peggy Tibbetts
The lives of six teens converge one Sunday morning on hill in Shiloh. One
is shot dead. This is the gripping tale of the events leading up to that
disastrous day.
Macy is 18 -- and a serial killer. But he wasn't born to kill. The reader
is introduced to an innocent toddler, raised by an abusive mother who left
him alone outside in the rain for hours, tied by the ankle to an old swing
set. Then she came home drunk. By the end of middle school, he was sent to
juvie for stealing. When he got out, he stole a car and was sent back. For
Macy, the food, accommodations, and attention at juvie were more than he
ever got at home. As a rebellious teen, he bought a gun and killed store
clerk, Mohammed Aziz. And got away with it. That's how the killing started.
After spending a year in prison for attempted robbery, he steals a car,
buys a gun and heads off on a killing spree that winds up in Shiloh.
Danny is a disabled 16 year-old who lives with his grandmother. He loves
monarch butterflies and Leah, the most beautiful girl in Shiloh. He works
at The Store with her younger sister, Sally. Leah's boyfriend, Chad is the
star athlete and he hates Danny. The Saturday afternoon Macy drives into
town, he sees Leah jogging. He chooses her for his next victim and abducts
her. In the search for her, the six teens end up on the hill that Sunday
morning. One is a killer, one is a victim, and everyone's life changes
forever.
Told in a third-person, easy-to-read, almost journalistic style, the
narrative flits -- like a monarch -- in and out of the lives of the people
who cross paths with Macy, those he victimizes and those who victimize him.
Shooting Monarchs is an excellent teaching aid for any class or
discussion about justice or social issues. In the end the reader must
decide Macy's fate. Does he deserve the death penalty?
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