Genre: Romance/Realistic Fiction
Number of pages: 390
Prudence always tries her best in everything she does, which is why she has no tolerance for those around her that she sees as lazy or unmotivated. The worst offender of this is her lab partner: Quint. He is always late, frequently does not do things he is supposed to, and never follows her instructions. One day, Prudence slips and falls hitting her head. When she wakes up she appears to have the ability to instantly reward or punish people for bad behavior. She calls this her ability to give instant karma, however, it does not seem to work on Quint. After a disastrous final presentation they are given the chance to redo it if they are willing to work together over the summer. Prudence desperately wants to improve her grade, but Quint has had enough of her condescending comments and eye rolls and is fine taking the grade as it stands. In order to try and convince Quint she goes to the local wildlife refuge where he works and finds herself getting pulled in to volunteering for the summer. She can’t help but notice how special this place is and the work they do for injured sea animals so she tries to help with fundraising efforts, but it’s hard for her to convince Quint her intentions are pure when her reasons for volunteering were to get him to redo the project. Can Prudence convince Quint to redo the project? Can Prudence figure out a way to improve the fundraising efforts of the refuge in order to help them succeed long term? Will Prudence and Quint ever see past their differences and possibly find something more?
This engaging story discusses many interesting topics including conservation, environmental issues, and even the economy and it’s effect on fundraising and small businesses. The characters are all very interesting and just memorable enough that the reader cannot help getting pulled in when Prudence’s integrity is questioned. Despite the title, instant karma is not the focus of the story, but readers who choose this title because of the karma premise will enjoy the dynamic between the characters and the overall story enough to keep reading.
Young Adult Book Reviews 