OUTRUN THE MOON (Stacey Lee) – YA Historical Fiction Novel

Initial Thoughts

Outrun the Moon is my third Stacey Lee novel. She has a good track record of setting her books in some of my favorite-to-read-about historical backdrops:

• Downstairs Girl – late 1800s
• Luck of the Titanic – the fated crossing of the Titanic
• Outrun the Moon – the 1906 San Francisco earthquake.

I really enjoyed Downstairs Girl, but I have enjoyed each subsequent Stacey Lee novel less and less.

I am quick to say there is nothing I found problematic about Outrun the Moon; I just (surprisingly) found it not in my wheelhouse. 

Plot Overview for Outrun the Moon

Mercy Wong is fifteen years old and living in Chinatown with her parents and little brother Jack. Mercy is determined to break out of the poverty in which they live, and she decides an education at St. Clare’s School for Girls is the best place to start. She manages to strike a deal with the owner of the school and becomes the only non-white girl in attendance. Navigating life at St. Clare’s is far more difficult than she imagined, but nothing compares to what happens when tragedy strikes in San Francisco on April 18th, 1906. 

Mixed Feelings

• Mercy is a formidable heroine. She’s clever, strong, perseverant, and hard-working. But I also found her a little bit annoying. She was, in some ways, too perfect. Her mistakes may have landed her in trouble, but she’s never in the wrong. She is literally the superhero of the book, and it felt a little bit unbelievable to me, especially considering she’s fifteen. 
• The supporting characters (primarily fellow students at St. Clare’s) are a sweet addition, but I have to admit, I wasn’t expecting the happenings at St. Clare’s to be such a heavy focus in the novel.
• While there were a few twists and dark moments, as a whole, the book had a very happy-ending-predictable feel to it. And speaking of the end, it was not very believable.

One particular thing I disliked was Lee’s use of idioms. It was definitely intentional and part of the writing style of the book, but I found it overdone and distracting. In my opinion, it didn’t feel like very strong writing and took away from the narrative as a whole.

Final Thoughts

Outrun the Moon is not a bad book, but it was definitely not a favorite. It is categorized as young adult, but it could have been aimed at an even younger audience, in my opinion. It was very clean and easy-to-read.

I would most certainly recommend Lee for American-Chinese stories because she is certainly good at that. This one just wasn’t a personal favorite!

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Copyright Stacey Lee and G.P. Putnam’s Sons. Image from Amazon.