Girl on a Wire by Gwenda Bond

genre: young adult

Jules Maroni is a wire walker - a pretty dang good one.  When her family of performers joins a new circus she's ready to show the world what she can do - but she doesn't anticipate meeting Remy. Remy the handsome trapeze artist, Remy who just happens to be a Garcia.  And Maronis don't become friends with Garcias - there is a history there that Jules doesn't understand and the consequences of the past are far-reaching.  Jules has to decide if she has the courage to be who she was meant to be and make her own rules in a tight-knit community where family is business.

I completely fell for this retelling of Romeo and Juliet.  The magical/fantasy element took me a bit by surprise and I had to stretch a little to just believe it but once I did, I really enjoyed myself.  Jules is a fleshed out teen - eager to prove herself and so breathlessly on the edge of a romance that she really wants.  The plot all plays out along the backdrop of the circus and its season - which I found fascinating.  I switched between audio and ebook on this one and the audio was quite good - the narrator had a good feel for the story.  The story got a little slow in places and a few of the secondary characters were a little flat but I still liked it a lot, especially the very end.  I love an ending that catches me by surprise in a good way.