Skin Deep

Jenna Blake's second semester in college is off to a good start. She has a new boyfriend and a job she loves in the county medical examiner's office. Then an African-American couple on campus is brutally attacked. Racial tension suddenly floods her normally liberal campus. The African-American students don't think the police are doing all they can to find the killer. When a white student is killed, the campus erupts in a storm of protests, rallies and peace marches. As the violence escalates, Jenna finds herself defending her own interracial romance and frantically looking for clues to the killer's identity. Many librarians for young adults call Christopher Golden the bridge between Caroline B. Cooney and Steven King. With Jenna, he has created a character that is smart and determined. Her steely nerve is perfectly captured by narrator Julie Dretzin.