RaveBookforum...[a] riveting, assured debut ... This is not a novel of answered questions or clear-cut resolutions—like Cat, Buntin focuses on the way memory obscures and warps, and how the act of storytelling itself may be the closest thing we have to the truth ... Despite their immaturity and messy choices, both girls are deeply endearing; Buntin excels at capturing the longing and intensity of being a teenager ... Because of its confessional, self-referential tone, Marlena is engrossing in the way the very best literary memoirs are.It’s magical to see someone making sense out of the chaos of their history through carefully chosen words, to see a person so compelled by these events they can’t help but craft their experience into a story. But it’s a trick: like Marlena’s pin full of pills, Buntin’s masterful technique is hidden in plain sight; Cat’s voice is so precise and convincing it’s easy to forget that she too is an invention.
Annie DeWitt
RaveBookforum...[a] strange and striking debut novel ... Though this sounds like the set-up for a traditional coming-of-age story, DeWitt takes this premise into new, truly surprising territory ... Like Jean herself, the language in White Nights radiates heat.
