Bone Gap is a fantasy novel written by Laura Ruby about the small town of Bone Gap that has a way of making things disappear. In it, we follow the story of Finn O’Sullivan who saw his friend Roza being kidnapped by a man whose face he cannot remember. While no one in town believes Finn and thinks Roza simply left, Finn begins to discover the “gaps” within the town in hopes of finding Roza and along the way even finds love.

I find Bone Gap a very interesting novel to read. Its main character Finn has a relatively unknown disorder called prosopagnosia, or face blindness, in which the affected person’s ability to recognize familiar faces, including their own, is impaired. The person instead uses a form of object discrimination, such as having big ears or the way a person walks, to discern one person from another. Finn’s disorder is explored throughout the novel and is detrimental to its parting message about beauty. It makes you look past a person’s face to see who they really are inside. The portrayal of prosopagnosia is well done and informative of how people who have it view life.

The book overall is well-written and full of imagery. It is unlike any other book I’ve read before. Its telling is mainly split between the points of views of Finn and Roza with a few other characters. I like the erratic order of the setting which could have you in the Bone Gap one chapter and in an old, mystical castle the next. The constant changing between places and time might make it slightly difficult to keep up, but the story is worth it. It bends reality with its fantasy elements which balances out the heaviness of reality. All the characters themselves are unique and detailed, adding on to the oddity that is the town of Bone Gap. It makes you reconsider your perspective of what real beauty is and how we see ourselves and others.

Bone Gap is even a winner of the 2016 Michael L. Printz Award for Excellence in Young Adult Literature.