What’s this? The e-version of my 2004 novel The Last Chance Texaco is free? Yup, that’s right — for limited time anyway.

And for what it’s worth, this is one of the most popular books I’ve ever written — at least in terms of fan letters and sales (it sold tens of thousands of copies!).

More details below. And if you like it, please help me spread the word by posting a review — or, hey, buying another one of my books.

The Last Chance Texaco
By Brent Hartinger

(For readers 12 and up)

Fifteen years old and parentless, Lucy Pitt has spent the last eight years being shifted from one foster home to another. Now she’s ended up at Kindle Home, a place for foster kids who aren‘t wanted anywhere else. Among the residents, Kindle Home is known as the Last Chance Texaco, because it’s the last stop before being shipped off to the high-security juvenile detention center on nearby Rabbit Island–better known as Eat-Their-Young Island to anyone who knows what it‘s really like.

But Lucy finds that Kindle Home is different from past group homes, and she soon decides she wants to stay. Problem is, someone is starting a series of car-fires in the neighborhood in an effort to get the house shut down. Could it be Joy, a spiteful Kindle Home resident? Or maybe it’s Alicia, the bony blond supermodel-wannabe from the local high school who thinks Lucy has stolen her boyfriend. Lucy suspects it might even be Emil, the Kindle Home therapist, who clearly has a low opinion of the kids he counsels. Whoever it is, Lucy must expose the criminal, or she’ll lose not just her new home, but her one last chance for happiness.

In the tradition of S.E. Hinton’s The Outsiders and Louis Sachar’s Holes, Hartinger writes about a subculture of teenagers many people would like to forget, in a novel as fast-paced and provocative as his first book, Geography Club.

Awards and Honors

• A 2005 ALA Quick Pick for Reluctant Readers
• A Yahoo.com Summer Read
• An ALA “Popular Paperback”
• A Teenreads.com “Best of 2004″
• A Genrefluent “Favorite of 2004″
• A MyShelf “2004 Favorite”
• A 2005-2006 Missouri Public Library “Best of the Best”
• A 2006 Michigan Library “Thumbs Up!” Award Nominee
• A 2006 Utah Library “Beehive Award” Nominee
• An 2006-2007 Iowa “Teen Award” Nominee
• A 2006-2007 South Carolina Young Adult Book Award Nominee
• A 2005 Maryland Library “Great Book”
• A 2005-2006 Maine Student Book Award Nominee
• A 2004 Texas HS Reading List (TAYSHAS) Pick
• A 2007-2007 Missouri “Gateway Award” Nominee
• A 2006-2007 Berkeley Book Award Nominee
• A Girls Life Top Ten Summer Read
• An EmbracingTheChild.org Book of the Month

Reviews

“Hartinger draws on his own previous experience as a group-home counselor to write a fast-paced, riveting story filled with multi-dimensional characters who command our admiration as they struggle against their personal demons…This book should have wide appeal to parents and adolescents alike. Grade: A”
– Rocky Mountain News

“The Last Chance Texaco has everything a reader could want…Never have I read a book that screamed so loudly to be made into a movie…Don’t pass this one up!”
–MyShelf.com

“A fast-moving, heartfelt story…beautifully conceived and executed, very well written [with] characters who seem very real…brutally honest [but] full of hope…You won’t be taking a chance with The Last Chance Texaco. It will reward you on every page.”
– (Oregon) Statesman Journal

“Hartinger clearly knows the culture [of group home life]…The talk is lively, and the whodunnit will keep readers hooked to the end.”
– Booklist

“Readers will root for Lucy and come away with a greater understanding of the complexities of group homes and their inhabitants. Hartinger excels at giving readers an insider’s view of the subculture.”
– School Library Journal

“Hartinger has a wonderful ear for the diction and eye for the furniture, of all sorts…Lucy, cagey and smart, becomes a character we care about.”
– Chicago Tribune

“After dealing with kids in the system for 17 years and living with foster kids 13 years, I look very closely at books about them and usually find them wanting, but The Last Chance Texaco is right on. Hartinger captured the voices of the kids perfectly and portrays [the situation] extremely well.”
– Genrefluent

“The Last Chance Texaco is a fast-paced, dramatic story, populated with authentic characters…His dialogue is pitch-perfect and his narrative is utterly believable.”
– The Bremerton Sun