This book drew me in from the get-go and I had to keep reading to find out what happened! I loved the relationship between Frankie and Zeke and could almost feel the hot, lazy, semi-crazy summer they were just trying to get through. Zeke is such a catalyst for lonely Frankie and all of her teenage angst and it interesting seeing how each react to the artistic outlet they discover and then the consequences when others take it in a dangerous direction. I will definitely recommend this book. Thank you to HarperCollins and NetGalley for the early read in return for my honest opinion. 4.5 stars

A charming novel of teen friendships, crushes, art, and how the story can get bigger than we ever planned. I really enjoyed this read. Thank you for the arc.

This was a truly bizarre and beautiful story. I just love the way Kevin Wilson writes. It’s simple, but also lyrical. This book is very understated and not elaborate by any means, but I think that style fit this story well. It was more character driven than plot driven, but the plot was certainly interesting! It felt like a YA/literary fiction mix. And I loved the characters! Frankie and Zeke had such a sweet friendship/relationship. And I also loved Frankie’s relationship with her mother. I would have liked a little more closure at the end of the book, however, the open ending really fit the vibe of this story. If you’re looking for a really unique and different book, grab this one! It was sad and sweet and liberating. Definitely read the author’s note as well for his insight on the inspiration for this book. It was beautifully written.
TW: death, mental illness, infidelity

Thank you to NetGalley and Ecco for an advanced digital reader’s copy in exchange for an honest review.

https://www.goodreads.com/review/show/5017987401?utm_medium=email&utm_source=like_notification&ref_=pe_7171740_475446060

Thanks to Netgalley and Ecco for the opportunity to read and review this book prior to publication. I absolutely loved Nothing to See Here, and I was delighted to get an advanced reader copy of this new one. And after abandoning my previous netgalley book, I was excited that the pages were turning faster in this one. However, two other books I read in the last week were chunkers, both 5 stars, so when I went back to this one I was in a bit of a book hangover, and I found I just did not care anymore. I am not going to continue this read - I think it is just not for me. I stopped at 32%.

I’m a big fan of Kevin Wilson. Nothing to See Here is a book I recommend often and stands as a favorite. This November release was most definitely one of my most anticipated of the year.

I can see what the author is trying to do here but boy was it a struggle for me to get through. I found myself detached from the characters and a bit perplexed at the whole plot. A bit odd, which is fine, but I just didn’t care or have any investment in the story.

Unfortunately this was a miss but I still recommend you pick up his previous book.

Having loved Nothing to See Here, I was excited to be approved for Kevin Wilson's upcoming release, even though I knew nothing of the premise going in. What I found was a sweet, albeit strange, story of two teen misfits who become friends during a long mid-1990s summer in a small town where there's not much to do. The entire plot revolves around a seemingly benign idea they have while bored on a hot day: make a poster and anonymously hang it up all over town. What follows is a story of obsession, heartbreak, misunderstanding, coming of age, and ultimately the effect everything has on their friendship.

I found the story unique and interesting but I had trouble connecting with the main character's obsession with the poster and everything surrounding it. I kept waiting for something big to happen, but it didn't live up to my expectations. It did remind me a little of One Two Three by Laurie Frankel, another followup to a favorite (This Is How It Always Is) that didn't quite do it for me.

Thanks to NetGalley and Ecco for the ARC.

I'm a longtime Kevin Wilson fan -- all of his books are incredible, but I feel comfortable saying that NOW IS NOT THE TIME TO PANIC is his best yet. What a BOOK, my god. Frankie is a terribly relatable protagonist, and I would read nine hundred more pages of the world filtered through her solipsistic gaze. Zeke (or, more accurately, "Zeke" as the version of a person refracted by one woman's desperate attempts to cling to the memory of one important summer) is lovely and tender and heartbreaking, and the relationship that blossoms between him and Frankie is achingly perfect. What a beautiful meditation on the power of art, of ideas, and the influence one person can have when they really see you, even if only for a moment. Absolutely phenomenal book -- I'll be pressing it into the hands of every customer!

Ideas, whether true or not, have power. They can soothe or excite fear and panic. Consider how the passing of a queen united the world while the delusion of a stolen election led to riots and mayhem. In this coming-of-age story, Wilson shows us how a piece of outsider art created by a couple of misfit teenagers during a sleepy summer in rural Tennessee panicked a community. This hook notwithstanding, Wilson’s novel is really about nostalgia. His characters look back on a time in their youth when events went spectacularly off the rails and ultimately impacted their futures.

Coalfield is an isolated small town in Tennessee. During the summer of 1996 it was just plain boring. “It’s like a bomb was dropped on it,” says Zeke, a recent transplant from Memphis, “and you guys are just getting back to normal.” His accomplice is Frankie Budge, a 16-year-old aspiring writer who is equally bored by the whole scene. The duo plans a poster that combines their talents—he makes images, and she writes words. The poster features the enigmatic phrase, “The edge is a shantytown filled with gold seekers. We are fugitives, and the law is skinny with hunger for us.” They are shocked by the troubling reactions of the townspeople after the teenagers plaster the poster just about everywhere. In addition to fashion statements, tourists and copycats, the posters also prompt violence and even a few deaths. All of this threatens and eventually extinguishes the teens’ friendship. Things come to a head a couple of decades later when Frankie, now a successful writer and family member, is forced to confront the “Coalfield Panic” by a writer who plans to reveal all in a New Yorker article.

This is a satisfying and illuminating read. Wilson’s first-person narrative is very personal, capturing the uncertainties of adolescence while exploring the creative process. His plot is fast paced and accompanied by plenty of snappy dialogue. While often humorous, his tone never fails to show compassion for his youthful protagonists.

Thank you for this ARC! This was an interesting book and I am glad I read it! The plot was strange at times and gave you a lot to think about. It would be a good choice for a book club to discuss. The main character was incredibly relatable and likable. I enjoyed reading her about her journey.

It's just ok to read, nothing groundbreaking or particularly inspiring. A second or third purchase for most libraries.

For the most part, I really, really liked this book. I thought the story was really engaging and the foreword made the concept behind the story super interesting. The story of of Frankie and Zeke's art has hints of the satanic panic to it, and it was fun to watch how their art took on a life of itself. The only thing that keeps my review for being 5 stars is that the ending feels a bit rushed. The book is short--256 pages on my e-reader--so it almost felt like part of the story was missing once we get to see more of the characters as adults.

Thank you, NetGalley, for the ARC of this book.

Kevin Wilson's latest novel, Now is not the Time to Panic, is about a friendship between 16-year-old Frankie, a writer and her new friend Zeke, an artist, who has just moved to Coalfield from Memphis. The two meet when there is this competition at the public pool to dive for watermelons and Frankie has always shunned this annual activity, but Zeke wants to win.. In addition to their interest in the arts, they have other things in common, teenage angst and fraught relationships with their parents. It’s summertime and they’re bored, so they start hanging out together - making out and also making art. One phrase that Frankie writes really sticks out and ends up becoming part of a poster than Zeke draws, and they decide to make copies and hang it up all over town. This work of art that they’ve created together takes on a life of its own, known to others as the Coalfield Panic of 1996 leading to lots of unintended consequences. It’s a book about friendship, art and memory. Fast and fascinating.

I really loved Kevin Wilson's last book, "Nothing to See Here", and could not wait to read his upcoming book "Now is Not the Time to Panic". Sadly, I just did not like this book that much, and I think it had to do with the main character, Frankie Budge. I just cd not relate to Frankie, and her quest to chain her small town with the art she created with her new friend, Zeke. Both Frankie and Zeke are outsiders - both have been abandoned by their fathers. Tied together as misfits, they bond one summer over art and a longing to be "seen" and belong in their town. They create a piece of art with a saying that Frankie, (an aspiring author) writes - "The edge is a shantytown filled with gold seekers. We are fugitives, and the law is skinny with hunger for us." They make copies on a copier that Frankie's triplet brothers stole one year from a warehouse. The poster and the saying develop a life of their own, and Wilson shows a world that is confused by the art, inspired by the art, and fearful of the art - this portion of the book would make a great book discussion, particularly because in a poignant foreword Wilson explains how when he started college at Vanderbilt, and felt like an outsider himself, a friend shared these exact words, and they became his mantra.
Sadly, the violence that transpires, and Frankie's ability to just brush it off and continue printing and posting her art, despite what it does to her friend Zeke just was too much for me. There is a sort of reckoning at the end, but no real repercussions for Frankie legally, although personally her husband's faith in her is tested. An interesting book, but I did not love it. Thank you to Netgalley and the publisher for providing a copy. I still feel like Wilson is a very talented writer - just not the right book for me.

If you’ve been following my reviews for the last year, you’ll know that I’ve been struggling to read books that feature lonely characters–and perhaps that’s why much of this list is dominated by books about friendship, family, and connection. Kevin Wilson’s Now is Not the Time to Panic is the novel that most directly addresses the pain of loneliness and the lifeline that one intimate relationship can offer. The novel begins when our narrator Frankie, a sixteen year old Nancy Drew devotee who feels much younger than her peers, meets Zeke, a boy whose family crisis has forced a move to Frankie’s small town. Both are outsiders who bond over their shared artistic temperaments, familial dysfunction, and sense of boredom, and together they decide to spend their summer creating art. That pursuit will bond them, change them, and send their town into a dizzying upheaval. Wilson is a superb writer, especially when it comes to his characters’ dialogue, which is brimming with life. He also manages to portray the experience of being a teenager in a way that feels very true to me, yet that I rarely see in the books I encounter. These teens aren’t so much angsty as anguished; they’re lonely, uncertain, self-conscious, and yet so sure of their own special place in the world. The novel begins with an author’s note in which Kevin Wilson shares the deeply personal story of how this book came about. simultaneously singular and relatable, it gives a weightiness to the novel and left me believing that all author’s notes should precede the text. Now is Not the Time to Panic is tender and moving, with enough quirkiness and edge to keep it from being saccharine. It’s the perfect book to pick up this fall if you need something hopeful but struggle with anything too sweet.

Fall reading mood: you want to feel less alone

Read this if you like: Tomorrow and Tomorrow and Tomorrow by Gabrielle Zevin, The Amazing Adventures of Kavalier and Klay by Michael Chabon, found family stories, books that capture the debilitating embarrassment of the teen years, books that follow characters for decades, stories that can be described as charming or quirky

“The edge is a shantytown filled with gold seekers, we are the new fugitives, and the law is skinny with hunger for us.” Sixteen-year-old Frankie, future writer of successful YA books, thought up that line. It was part of a teenage prank cooked up by her and her summer bestie Zeke, two bored teenagers trapped in a small, boring town. Frankie wrote the line down on paper, and budding artist Zeke drew around the words, creating their own personal ‘tag.’ Piercing their fingers, they spotted the paper with their blood, imagined stars. Using the copier Frankie’s older brothers had stolen and hidden in the garage, the pair made thousands of copies which they posted throughout the town.

Small towns. I lived in a few back in the 90s. I grew up in the ‘burbs, so I had little understanding of how small towns worked. I was told that the bank was the hub of the rumor network where gossip was a commodity. A woman warned a man who had returned to his hometown should not to carry his purse on the street or he would get beat up. The Klan left posters in rural driveways. I would be told not to take our son to the preschool filled with ‘those people,’ i.e., the rural poor. Adults were sure that role playing games were causing physic harm to teenagers unable to keep their roles and reality separate, or that the games were leading them to worship the devil.

So when Frankie and Zeke obsessed over getting their art across the town, I was not surprised that the townspeople reacted in fear, imagining it a sinister message. That other teens made an icon of the poster, and used adult’s fear to claim they were victims of imagined, evil, deviants. That they patrolled the streets with guns, looking for trouble where there was none. That things went crazy, and people died.

Ten years later, Frankie is a successful writer, happily married with a child. Happy. But haunted by that summer, those words still echoing in her head constantly. A phone call from a stranger threatens to upend everything. But first, it was time to tell her story to her family, and to find Zeke and warn him of what is to come.

The characters feel out of sync with the world, turning to art for expression and to make an impact. Art is their obsession, but what they create is misunderstood and feared by their isolated community. What they create is misappropriated and copied. Once out in the world, they can’t control what happens. They struggle with pride of what they created and the guilt of how it was misused. As an adult, Zeke struggles with mental health issues and Frankie can’t shake off those few months of combustive creativity and excitement.

The characters learn the nature of art and it’s impact, the rush of expression, the joy of putting it out there. Then watching what happens to it in the world, out of your ability to control it.

I read the novel in a day.

I received a free egalley from the publisher through NetGalley. My review is fair and unbiased.

I really liked Wilson's Nothing to See Here--found it quite clever, original, quirky. Therefore, I requested his newest book, hoping for a similar read. Not so much.

The setting: "Sixteen-year-old Frankie Budge—aspiring writer, indifferent student, offbeat loner—is determined to make it through yet another sad summer in Coalfield, Tennessee, when she meets Zeke, a talented artist who has just moved into his grandmother’s unhappy house and who is as lonely and awkward as Frankie." They make an unsigned poster [finding an unused zerox copier in Frankie's garage] which they plaster all over town. The poster has a phrase: "The edge is a shantytown filled with gold seekers. We are fugitives, and the law is skinny with hunger for us." OK--I like it. BUT...

The posters take on a life of their own and Frankie, especially becomes consumed. They make numerous copies and map where they place them. People wonder--who's behind this? It causes a panic.

The two are awkward teenagers who don't fit in, but when they find each other something clicks. Add in Frankie's three triplet brothers for many laughs. Her mother is somewhat amusing--she has much to deal with! Zeke's family has but a minor role.

There is sweetness to this coming of age story, life in a small town--neighbors, family. and lack thereof,

Twenty years later, a journalist, Mazzy Brower, tracks down Frankie [now married with a daughter] hoping to uncover the true story of the Coalfield Panic of 1996. But Frankie also wants to get back in touch with Zeke first. {This is very much in the latter part of the book.]

This was, for me, a bumpy, repetitive ride. I enjoyed it--to a point, but was disappointed. And I did not care for the ending.

I really enjoyed the first half of this. I liked the two teens becoming friends, making art, and doing "devious" things. But then it just became an obsession with the art and not moving on from it. The author's note gave some insight into that, but I think another plot line was needed because it fell a little flat to me.

Now Is Not the Time to Panic, . . . but I love Kevin Wilson, and my thrills over this new book might be misconstrued as a sort of panic -- albeit, the good kind. A brilliant work from an immensely talented writer.

How lucky we are that Kevin Wilson has another book out! Now Is Not the Time to Panic is a moving story about art, connection, finding your way, and discovering who you are -- told in a way that only Kevin Wilson can do. I couldn't put the book down!