Triple Threat by Lara Sleath

Triple Threat by Lara Sleath
Publisher: Evernight Publishing
Genre: Young Adult (14 – 18 y.o.), Romance, Contemporary
Rating: 3 Stars
Reviewed by Astilbe

Charli Reily needs to be a Broadway star. It’s the only way she can escape her sucky new life in the crappiest part of Vancouver. Here, her only friend is Logan, the boy with the biceps from across the road, who has the latest high-top runners and enough street smarts for them both.

To get to Broadway, Charli needs to be a triple threat. She has to be able to dance, as well as act and sing. When the owner of the local dance shop offers to teach her for free, she finally feels like she’s inching toward her dreams. Not that Logan’s happy. He doesn’t want her flitting off to Broadway. He wants her to stay in the hood with him.

Then Charli does something seriously bad. She confesses the shameful details to Logan without realizing that she’s given him the ammunition to start blackmailing her.

Soon she faces a choice–stand up to him and risk her future? Or get sucked into a downward spiral of doing increasingly messed-up things.

It’s not as hard as it may seem to live your dreams.

Some of my favorite scenes were the ones that showed how the adults in Charli’s life reacted to her mistakes. Not only were their reactions great indications of their upstanding characters, they were also filled with genuine kindness. This is something I’m always excited to come across, especially in the young adult genre where grown-ups are so often portrayed in less flattering ways.

I would have liked to see more development of Charli’s relationship with Logan. They both struggled to find emotionally healthy coping skills for their problems. Logan also had issues with poor communication and an urge to control the main character in ways that made me shudder. This storyline continued to intensify over time, so I was surprised to see how quickly it was resolved. There was so much more the author could have done with it.

The ending was otherwise realistic and well done. I appreciated the fact that it acknowledged the obstacles Charli was facing while also giving her some sensible ways to overcome them that also happened to fit Canadian culture well. It was lovely to catch those subtle cultural references, although the plot could be understood perfectly well without them, too. While I would read a sequel if one is ever written, I also felt pretty satisfied with everything I’d gotten to know about these characters.

Triple Threat was a wild ride. Anyone who enjoys stories set in Canada should take special note of it.