Author: Lauren McLaughlin

ISBN: 978-0-375-85191-9

Publisher: Random House Books For Young Readers

Every once in a while – if you are lucky – you come across a fascinating book such as Cycler. You become so engrossed in it that you forget everything else.

McLaughlin’s Cycler is a well written, witty, albeit far-flung tale of a hermaphrodite. It is rich with sensory details, titillating particulars, surprising twists and realistic characters that seem to be living and breathing. In a rapid fire style, she delivers a credible plot even if it is implausible.

Jill is a “normal” high school student dreaming of her beau asking her to go to the Prom. She normally hangs with her best buddy Ramie who thinks she knows her intimately.

In a cycle of once a month, Jill disappears from life at school and pretends that she is having blood transfusions. In reality, Jack, her alter ego, with all the right apparatus, appears once a month to create havoc in her “girlie” life. Only her parents know of her condition and strive to lock him up in “his/her” room. But Jack has other ideas to “free” himself of Jill and fulfill his sexual desires.

Told through alternating chapters from the minds of Jack and Jill, Lauren McLaughlin perfectly captures the voice of both the teenage male and female. Cycler's in your face approach combined with the underlying issues of homosexuality, self-esteem and dating provides readers with a tale that’s guaranteed to get them talking.

According to the New York Times Book Review of September 12, 2008 "The striking jacket of this oddball first novel says it all: the girl on the front cover becomes an almost identical-looking boy on the back."

This is a masterful achievement by a first time YA novel writer.  Lauren McLauhglin spent ten years in the film industry writing films as Hypercube, Specimen and Prisoner of Love. She also produced films and worked as production executive on American Psycho, Buffalo ’66, and several other movies. After a brief stint writing the flash animation series Maatkara and the award-winning Chi-Chian for SciFi.com, she abandoned her screen ambitions to write fiction. Her short story Sheila was selected for Year’s Best SF. Lauren lives with her husband in Brooklyn, where she is currently at work on the sequel of Cycler.

Cycler is definitely a recommended good read for YA and their parents alike.