Beth Fish Reads: Today's Read: Red by Alison Cherry

15 October 2013

Today's Read: Red by Alison Cherry

What if you were the one of the most popular girls in high school, thanks to your beautiful coppery tresses. Now suppose someone found out that you've been a lifelong fake and is threatening to reveal you're a natural strawberry blond. For Felicity St. John, such exposure would destroy her life and dreams, seeing that her home town gives preferential treatment to redheads.

Every town has a dirty little secret. Some have underground drug rings. Others look away while prostitution flourishes. A select few shelter branches of the Mob.

Scarletville's secret was Rouge-o-Rama.

There was rampant speculation among the town's residents over where the underground hair salon was located and what it looked like.

—Red by Alison Cherry (Random House Children's Books / Delacorte Press, 2013, p. 20; uncorrected proof)

Quick Facts

Setting: Scarletville, Iowa, the National Redhead Sanctuary
Circumstances: Redheads have all the advantages in Scarletville; Felicity is pretty, kind, and popular but has a secret: she's not a natural redhead; if her secret is revealed, she will lose the Miss Scarlet beauty pageant and with it the money she needs to attend art school; a blackmailer makes her rethink the town's priorities
Characters: Felicity St. John; Ginger St. John, her mom; Haylie and Ivy, her BFFs; Brent, her football-playing boyfriend; various classmates and their parents; other townsfolk
Genre: contemporary young adult; satire; humor
Major themes: the superficiality of prejudices; friendship; mother-daughter relationships; staying true to oneself; secrets; navigating the high school social scene; peer pressure
Miscellaneous: although the premise seems silly, substitute hair color with weight or religion (for example) and you'll see that the novel makes some serious points
Thoughts so far: fun quick read that will appeal to younger teens and their parents; good mother-daughter book club pick

22 comments:

Natalie @ Book Lovers Life, 10/15/13, 7:29 AM: Sounds different! Love the colour of the girls hair on the cover!! :)
Kim@Time2Read, 10/15/13, 7:42 AM: Great teaser! Rouge-a-Rama!
Here's my teaser!
Karen and Gerard, 10/15/13, 8:21 AM: Funny teaser, what a thing to worry about! Thanks for stopping by earlier.
Karen White, 10/15/13, 8:52 AM: This looks like fun. Makes me wonder if the author's last name is a pseudonym, or if it inspired the subject matter?
Love Africa Book Club, 10/15/13, 9:30 AM: LOL. An underground hair salon. Love the humor in this teaser.

Here's mine
http://lovebitessilkties.blogspot.co.uk/2013/10/teasertuesday-power-play-resistance-by.html
Chanzie, 10/15/13, 10:00 AM: This sounds different. Wonder why Red heads get special treatments...
Great teaser!

Thanks for stopping by my TT.

Chanzie @ Mean Who You Are

http://meanwhoyouare.blogspot.com/2013/10/teaser-tuesday-6-tale-of-vampire-bride.html
Sandra Nachlinger, 10/15/13, 10:27 AM: This sounds like a fun story--but with a moral to it! I can see how it would be a good read to share with a daughter or granddaughter.
My Teaser today is from KEEPSAKE.
Laurel-Rain Snow, 10/15/13, 10:31 AM: Your comments put a whole new perspective on this one for me...now I'm intrigued. Thanks for sharing.

Here's MY TUESDAY MEMES POST
bermudaonion, 10/15/13, 10:39 AM: I love the themes of this and can see how it would make a good mother daughter book club choice.
Alice Audrey, 10/15/13, 11:08 AM: Ooo, I like this one. Great teaser.
Unknown, 10/15/13, 11:18 AM: Usually I wouldn't be interested in something like that, (since it does seem silly) but you brought up some great points. It seems interesting though, and different, definitely has that going for it.

Heres mine

Kirsty @ StudioReads
Anonymous, 10/15/13, 4:28 PM: Sounds good, enjoy!

http://tributebooksmama.blogspot.com/2013/10/teaser-tuesday_15.html
Nise' , 10/15/13, 4:39 PM: I love it and will keep an eye out for this book.
Yvonne, 10/15/13, 7:03 PM: This sounds good.
Shelley Munro, 10/15/13, 7:17 PM: What a great concept. Sounds like a great tongue-in-cheek read.
Margot, 10/15/13, 7:23 PM: i like the sound of this one.
Anonymous, 10/15/13, 7:50 PM: I like the premise and feel like it might use sarcastic wit and dry humor to get its point across. By the way, my youngest daughter has that color hair (true auburn). She never liked being different but now she only gets compliments so she enjoys being different. :)
Naomi Hop, 10/15/13, 8:37 PM: Nice tease. Sounds like a great read!

Thanx for visiting my TT
Naomi @ Nomi’s Paranormal Palace
Julie P., 10/15/13, 8:49 PM: My interest is piqued!
Diana, 10/16/13, 12:46 AM: Red is on my to read list as well. It sounds really good.
Enjoy!
Thanks for visiting our teaser.

Diana @ BookVenturers
Jany, 10/16/13, 1:07 AM: That's a great teaser! I've been wanting to read this book for a while now.. I think I might actually get it!
Here's mine: http://janysbookblog.wordpress.com/2013/10/16/teaser-tuesday-1/
Daryl, 10/21/13, 2:28 PM: this sounds fun ...