The Last Chance Texaco

Reviewed by Mark Frye, author and reviewer for TeensReadToo.com

Brent Hartinger has crafted a touching and suspenseful novel sure to capture and hold any teen reader's attention. He knows his craft well, having created an edgy novel about the foster care system with a tasteful, deft touch, ensuring it a wide readership. He has proven that tough issues and hard situations teens face can be portrayed with minimal violence and profanity.

Like his earlier novel, GEOGRAPHY CLUB, Hartinger has crafted several sympathetic characters among a microcosm of society's misfits. This novel's group of excluded teens are orphans, kids whose perception of themselves is nearly as negative as their peers at school, who deride them as "groupies" (foster show more children in group homes). The reader is drawn into their conflicts, both within their own walls, their own psyches, and with society-at-large.

The narrator, Lucy, has been a foster child for over half of her life. Kindle Home is the last, "safe" stop for teens like her, for those who have been in trouble. Children who "wash out" of Kindle Home are then sent to Rabbit Island, a place for teens beyond redemption--in the eyes of the system, at least. As a veteran of group homes, she vows to make an effort to fit in at Kindle, which proves to be difficult. Newcomers are viewed as a challenge of the "pecking order" and it isn't long before Lucy is facing serious challenges from others in the home.

Her school environment presents another challenge when she is caught in a social caste disagreement with two of her peers. In spite of the odds against them, she makes a friend from one of her earlier antagonists, a person who proves to be a crucial ally when Kindle Home faces community persecution and budget cuts. As the new friends try to find out who has been setting fires in the neighborhood in order to frame the members of Kindle Home, Hartinger provides an unexpected twist when he unveils the perpetrator.

With a heart-warming ending, Hartinger proves that edgy young adult fiction can still leave a reader with hope. THE LAST CHANCE TEXACO is suitable even for middle school-aged students. Recommended. show less

Told from the perspective of Lucy Pitt, a teenager tossed around in foster care and group homes since she was 7, LAST CHANCE TEXACO attempts to convey a setting and group of teens which young adults might not know much about. And while the concept is good, the story can get a little far-fetched at times and the narration caught up in too much explanation.

Lucy has finally been placed in the group home called Kindle Home, or the last stop before high-risk foster kids are sent to Rabbit Island, a place all of the foster kids we meet fear. Lucy feels that Kindle Home is different from other group homes, however, and she feels like she actually has a home. Throughout the novel she has to survive a new high school in which the only people she show more meets seem to be just like cartoon villains who hate her all because she came from a group home. And one villain very quickly falls in love with her! Perhaps the most annoying aspect of the narration is how many times Lucy will explain "that this is what group homes are like" or "when you're in a group home you get used to..." All around, there are unrealistically created characters and too much explanation where certain situations could have just spoken for themselves. However, there aren't many popular books about this subject, so it is still worth a read. show less

Told from the perspective of Lucy Pitt, a teenager tossed around in foster care and group homes since she was 7, LAST CHANCE TEXACO attempts to convey a setting and group of teens which young adults might not know much about. And while the concept is good, the story can get a little far-fetched at times and the narration caught up in too much explanation.

Lucy has finally been placed in the group home called Kindle Home, or the last stop before high-risk foster kids are sent to Rabbit Island, a place all of the foster kids we meet fear. Lucy feels that Kindle Home is different from other group homes, however, and she feels like she actually has a home. Throughout the novel she has to survive a new high school in which the only people she show more meets seem to be just like cartoon villains who hate her all because she came from a group home. And one villain very quickly falls in love with her! Perhaps the most annoying aspect of the narration is how many times Lucy will explain "that this is what group homes are like" or "when you're in a group home you get used to..." All around, there are unrealistically created characters and too much explanation where certain situations could have just spoken for themselves. However, there aren't many popular books about this subject, so it is still worth a read. show less

Ever since her parents died in a car crash, Lucy has spent her life bouncing from foster home to group home and back again. Plagued by behavior problems and an addiction to OxyContin, Lucy is placed at Kindle House, a group home nicknamed "The Last Chance Texaco" because it's the last stop before Rabbit Island, the high-security facility where nobody wants to end up. Lucy's first-person narrative reveals both her resentment at being moved to yet another group home and her fear of ending up at Rabbit Island. Better than I expected it to be.

This tale of teens stuck in the reform system is fast paced and fairly unpredictable. The characters are believable, however the plot contrivances almost drag down the novel. Many YA novels have the “cool adult that gets it” character. many seem cheap, but the one here is mostly believable. A good book for males and females, reluctant readers as well.

Lucy Pitt is at the end of the road. Orphaned a age 7, the past eight years has seen a series of foster and group homes unable to reach this troubled girl. The Kindle Home is known as the last stop for throw away teenagers; it's a shambling wreck of a formerly glorious home- but it's sticky doors and crumbling wallpaper fill a space that's laid dormant in Lucy's heart for so long.

When 15 year old Lucy Pitt arrives at Kindle Home she knows she better not mess up or she'll be sent to "Eat Your Young Island." The counselors here really seem to care, especially Leon, but she can control herself when students at her new school insult and harrass her.