The Sin-Eater's Confession

People in Merit, Wisconsin, always said Jimmy was . . . you know. But people said all sorts of stupid stuff. Nobody really knew anything. Nobody really knew Jimmy.

I guess you could say I knew Jimmy as well as anyone (which was not very well). I knew what scared him. And I knew he had dreams—even if I didn't understand them. Even if he nearly ruined my life to pursue them.

Jimmy's dead now, and I definitely know that better than anyone. I know about blood and bone and how bodies decompose. I know about shadows and stones and hatchets. I know what a last cry for help sounds like. I know what blood looks like on my own hands.

What I don't know is if I can trust my own eyes. I don't know who threw the stone. Who swung the hatchet? Who are the shadows? What do the living owe the dead?

“"When Del is killed in a head-on collision on prom night, Ben and his father, a deputy sheriff in their small Wisconsin town, pitch in to help on the family's farm. This brings them into contact with Del's younger brother. Jimmy seems to be a lost soul and Ben wants to help him, as he would a younger brother. Jimmy confides that he would like to be a photographer, admitting that he likes taking photos when the subjects do not know they are being photographed, and Ben never realizes that he is the subject of one of these candid shots until it is published. The firestorm that the innocent yet sensual photo creates turns the lives of both boys upside down, and the resulting homophobia results in Jimmy's murder. Reminiscent of Bick's Drowning Instinct (Carolrhoda Lab, 2012), the story is told in flashback, this time in diary-type letters. He feels guilt; perhaps he is to blame for what happened. He tries to work out who killed Jimmy, why he made the decisions he did, and why he is compelled to ingest not only his own sins, but Jimmy's as well. He exiles himself, first from his classmates, and then from the future his parents have planned for him--including Yale and medical school. Instead, he becomes a medic and chases death in Afghanistan. He learns that he is ready to stop running from and start running toward his life--whatever happens. He does not act as a moral beacon for others; he wants to escape the situation, and yet finds that his conscience will not let him. This novel should be in all YA collections, and would be interesting reading for members of GSA's." --School Library Journal”

"Bick (Drowning Instinct) crafts a powerful tale of bigotry and murder in small-town Wisconsin....a potent examination of teenage emotions and reactions to peer and parental pressures, and to the evil that people are capable of." --starred, Publishers Weekly

Ilsa J. Bick is a child psychiatrist, as well as a film scholar, surgeon wannabe, former Air Force major, and an award-winning, best-selling author of short stories, e-books, and novels. She has written extensively in the Star Trek, Battletech, Mechwarrior: Dark Age, and Shadowrun universes. Her original stories have been featured in numerous anthologies, magazines and online venues.  Ilsa's YA paranormal, Draw the Dark, was also a semifinalist for the 2009 Amazon Breakthrough Novel Award (as Stalag Winter).  Ilsa currently lives with her family and other furry creatures in rural Wisconsin and across the street from the local Hebrew cemetery. One thing she loves about the neighbors: They're very quiet and come around for sugar only once in a blue moon.

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