The Disability Book Archive

[ID: A book cover. The title “Bone Gap” is written down the centre of the cover in large black capitals. There image of a large, yellow bee in the centre separates the two words. The author’s name “Laura Ruby” is written at the bottom of the cover in smaller red capitals. The background is a grey and white honeycomb pattern. /end]

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Content Warning:

Provided by submitter:

• Kidnapping
• Implied rape or attempted rape (it’s unclear)
• Implied domestic abuse
• Brief mention of someone being stung by bees
• Someone gets kicked / stomped by a horse
• Brief mention of a different horse wasting away and dying
• Someone getting bullied (both beaten up and insulted) on page

Storygraph warnings:

• Kidnapping
• Bullying
• Confinement
• Self Harm
• Sexual Content
• Violence
• Sexual Assault
• Blood
• Sexual Harassment

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Summary:

Everyone knows Bone Gap is full of gaps—gaps to trip you up, gaps to slide through so you can disappear forever. So when young, beautiful Roza went missing, the people of Bone Gap weren’t surprised. After all, it wasn’t the first time that someone had slipped away and left Finn and Sean O’Sullivan on their own. Just a few years before, their mother had high-tailed it to Oregon for a brand new guy, a brand new life. That’s just how things go, the people said. Who are you going to blame?

Finn knows that’s not what happened with Roza. He knows she was kidnapped, ripped from the cornfields by a dangerous man whose face he cannot remember. But the searches turned up nothing, and no one believes him anymore. Not even Sean, who has more reason to find Roza than anyone, and every reason to blame Finn for letting her go.

As we follow the stories of Finn, Roza, and the people of Bone Gap—their melancholy pasts, their terrifying presents, their uncertain futures—acclaimed author Laura Ruby weaves a heartbreaking tale of love and loss, magic and mystery, regret and forgiveness—a story about how the face the world sees is never the sum of who we are.

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Notes:

There is an audiobook.

There is an ebook. There is a kindle edition.

This book won the 2016 Michael L. Printz Award for Excellence in Young Adult Literature, and was a finalist for the National Book Awrd.

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Archivist Comments:

Apparently one of the “bully” side characters comes out as gay in the final chapter on the novel and introduces his boyfriend. This is an aspect of the story that has been fairly divisive amongst readers.

I did not know that Bone Gap was a real place. (It’s in Illinois)

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